Greqi: Zbulohen baza të grupit terrorist ’17 nëntorit’

[Blendi]

greqi- Policia greke thotë se ka zbuluar të mërkurën në mbrëmje ndofta bazën kryesore të organizatës terroriste ’17 nëntori’. Në një apartament të nëndheshëm, rreth dy kilometra afër qendrës së Athinës janë gjetur armë dhe municione, si dhe flamuri i organizatës terroriste.

Organizata është përgjegjëse për vrasjen e 23 personave, kryesisht biznesmenë e politikanë grekë, si dhe diplomatë e zyrtarë të shërbimeve të huaja sekrete. Agjencia zyrtare e lajmeve, ANA, ka cituar një burim të policisë që thotë se operacioni, që ende vazhdon, përbën "fillimin e asgjësimit të organizatës më të madhe terroriste greke". Zyrtari i policisë tha se "është çështje ditësh që ky kapitull të mbyllet përfundimisht".

Ministria e rendit publik ka publikuar fotografi të një atentatori që u plagos të shtunën në Pire, çka në një farë mënyre inicoi angazhimin e paprecedent të policisë greke kundër terrorizmit. Zëdhënësi i ministrisë së rendit tha se fotografitë publikohen me qëllim që të gjenden të dhëna të tjera për atentatorin, për të cilin, thonë ata, nuk ka më asnjë dyshim se është pjesëtar i organizatës terroriste.

Tre helikopterë vërtiteshin mbi një nga lagjet më të populluara të kryeqytetit dhe gjatë gjithë natës janë kryer me dhjetra arrestime.

Qindra policë mësynë në një pallat në rrugën ‘Patmu 84’, ndërsa snaiperë u vendosën në tarracën e pallatit. Policia u bëri thirrje banorëve që të evakuonin pallatin, ndërsa në rrugicën e ngushtë u vendosën edhe autoambluanca, si dhe makina zjarrfikëse.

[Emiljo]

Grupet terroriste shqiptare kane qene gjithmone shkaktare te ndotjes se identitetit shqiptar neper bote. Kapja dhe spastrimi i tyre do ishte shume positiv ne marrdhnjet e vendit tone me boten e jashtme pasi dihet qe shqiperia ne bote cilesohet si nje nga vendet me korrupsion edhe terrorizem "te ligjshem" Nderkohe qe pjesa me e madhe e shqipetareve kerkojne te ndertojne te ardhmen e tyre me pune e djerse, keto grupe me aktivitetet e tyre te paturpshme ia prishin imazhin e mire shqiptareve. Le te shpresojme qe ne te ardhmen shqiptaret do e kuptojne qe me dhune nuk arrihet asgje.

[Blendi]

POR ...
Kam pershtypjen se nuk e ke lexuar te gjithe ose nuk e ke lexuar fare., nese ti e di se me c`fare merret grupi November 17 nuk ka problem, por nese nuk e di pyet e te japim info.

Fjalet e tua per terrorizmin qendrojne, por ne rastin konkret kjo nuk ka te beje me Shqiperine fare me sa dime ne.
Eshte problem grek qe ndodh ne Greqi, i bere nga Greket. E kjo nuk ka lidhje ASPAK ME indentitetin shqiptar apo imazhin e tij ne bote.
pershendetje

[skerdi]

Pershendetje Blendi. Ke me shume te reja te diteve te fundit?

[reinald]

Mbreme ne darke 17/7/2002 kane arestuar nje burre reth 60 vjec dhe thone se ai eshte kapua h 17 nentorit.
Be in touch.

[Dita]

Informacion i mire per banden "November 17"


Nga New York Times i sotshem.

------------------------------



Greece Announces Terrorist Confessions
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS


Filed at 10:20 a.m. ET


ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Greek police announced a major breakthrough Thursday against the elusive and rabidly anti-American November 17 terrorist gang, saying that three members confessed to bombings and other killings, including the murders of military attaches from the United States and Britain.

In the first arrests of November 17 members after the group operated with impunity underground for more than a quarter of a century, police also said its Paris-born chief ideologist, Alexandros Giotopoulos, was in custody. Police said he was taken off a hydrofoil leaving the eastern Aegean island of Lipsi on Wednesday.

Giotopoulos, 58, had been living under the assumed name Michalis Economou and was believed to have been active in the Paris-based student opposition to the military dictatorship that ruled Greece from 1967 to 1974. Police said he was living in France and in Greece and was married to a French woman.

November 17, which police estimate has fewer than a dozen members, was believed to have targeted Americans and their allies because of Washington's perceived backing of the Greek military dictatorship.

Giotopoulos' father was Dimitris Giotopoulos, a well-known 1930s communist theoretician and follower of Leon Trotsky, a founder along with Vladimir Lenin of the Soviet Union. Trotsky was subsequently assassinated while in Mexican exile.

``From various evidence in the investigation we began to build a picture of the ideological instructor of the organization and the writer of its proclamations,'' police chief Fotis Nassiakos said of Giotopoulos.

The confessions and capture of a leading figure in the group marked the first significant crack in Europe's most elusive terrorist organization since the group first appeared in 1975 with the assassination of Richard Welch, the CIA's station chief in Athens.

Greece had come under intense pressure from the United States for its failure to make any arrests since then.

``We are on a good road, and we have made progress, but this requires time and thoroughness,'' government spokesman Christos Protopappas quoted Premier Costas Simitis as telling his Cabinet on Thursday.

``We must resist pressure which can lead to mistakes. This is not a movie that will end in two hours. We are proceeding with the total breakup of terrorism in this country,'' he said.

Authorities scored their first-ever success against the organization after a botched June 29 bombing in the busy tourist port of Piraeus. Savas Xiros, a 40-year-old painter of religious icons and brother of two of the men who are said to have confessed, was severely wounded when the bomb he allegedly was carrying exploded prematurely. He remains in the hospital and has not been charged.

November 17 has claimed responsibility for 22 killings and dozens of bomb and rocket attacks since Welch was assassinated. Blending extreme left-wing politics with nationalism, the group was named for the date of a 1973 student uprising against the military dictatorship.

November 17 members have killed four American officials and two Turkish diplomats as well as Greek businessmen and politicians. Its last victim was British defense attache Brig. Stephen Saunders, who was shot dead in June 2000.

Police identified the three men who made confessions as Christodoulos Xiros, 44, Vassilis Xiros, 30, and Dionissis Georgiakis, 26 -- all taken into custody Tuesday.

The Xiros brothers, part of a priest's extended middle-class family of 11 children, led normal lives and did not appear to have had any involvement in politics. Former U.S. government officials have alleged some members of the governing Socialist party may have sheltered the group.

``We feel relief in the Socialist party because for a long while we had this shadow over our heads,'' said former Socialist Foreign Minister Carolos Papoulias.

Authorities said Christodoulos Xiros confessed to participating in five killings from 1984 to 1992, including the deaths of two American military officials -- the June 1988 assassination of U.S. Embassy defense attache Capt. William Nordeen, and the March 1991 bombing death of Air Force Sgt. Ronald O. Stewart.

He also confessed to assassination attempts against two other American officials and the bombing of two buses carrying U.S. servicemen.

Police said his younger brother, Vassilis Xiros, confessed to participating in the 1997 killing of Greek-British businessman Constantinos Peratikos, the June 2000 shooting death of British Defense Attache Brig. Stephen Saunders and a rocket attack against the home of the German ambassador in 1999 which did not cause injuries.

Both men also participated in numerous bomb attacks and bank robberies, while the third man admitted to taking part in a bomb attack and a robbery.

Nassiakos said Giotopoulos' fingerprints matched those found in a November 17 hide-out raided by police in central Athens earlier this month after the capture of Savas Xiros in the bungled bomb attack. Police subsequently raided two Athens apartments used as weapons storehouses by November 17.

Authorities have identified one of the handguns found there as the weapon used to kill seven November 17 victims, including Saunders.

American, British and Greek authorities have for years suspected November 17 had a French connection, and that its leaders may have had their ideological roots in the leftist movements that fueled France's May 1968 student revolt. November 17 took responsibility for Welch's killing in a letter delivered to a Paris newspaper.

[alumni]

Po kjo a eshte veper terroriste?

[Blendi]

Jane kapur disa anetare. Dje arrestuan vellain e te Dyshuarit te pare. Gjithashtu u gjet arma (PISTOLETE colt 45) me te cilen ato bene atentatin e fundit ndaj Brigaderit anglez Saunders (atasheu ushtarak Britanik ne Athine ) , mendohet qe jane agjentet e Scotland Yard-it ato qe po ndihmojne greket ne kete operacion.

Nje fakt te ben te dyshosh, Sot Zedhenesi Policise Greke ( repartit anti-terrorrizem ) tha qe po e shpartallojme kete grup plotesisht e arrestime te tjera priten, e natyrshem te te lind pyetja:
Kur ato Proklamojne se po e shkaterrojne grupin N17 per 20 dite, c`fare i pengoi ate ta benin kete per 27 VJET?!

[Redi]

Blendi, ne Greqi ashtu si ne Itali apo edhe ne disa vende te tjera (perfshi edhe Shqiperine) mbizoteron ideologjia dhe mentaliteti majtist, madje ne shume rast ai ekstremist majtist sic eshte komunizmi.

Ne Greqi duke sunduar te majtet per shume kohe, sidomos me Papandreun qe njihej si nje antiamerikan dhe antikapitalist e hapur, kjo organizate nuk luftohej nga qeveria pasi i vinte per shtat ideollogjise mbizoteruese.

Sic shihet pas akteve te 11 shtatorit dhe pas fjales se Bushit; "O me ne o kundra nesh", nuk po tolerohet me ne kete drejtim.
Pra gjerat jane te qarta dhe kush quhet terrorist nuk ka tolerance.

Kini parasysh qe Greqia ishte nje nga vendet e para persa i perket listes se vendeve qe mbeshtesnin apo qe ushqenin organizata terroriste.

Shpresojme qe ti shkohet deri ne fund ketij operacioni dhe pastaj te vazhdojne me Birgadat e Kuqe ne Itali dhe organizatat e tjera terroriste ne Bote.

[alumni]

Greek Paper: Attack on NATO Foiled


By Patrick Quinn
Associated Press Writer
Sunday, July 21, 2002; 4:19 PM

ATHENS, Greece –– Greek authorities on Sunday charged two alleged members of the November 17 terror organization in the assassination of American and British servicemen, and a newspaper reported the deadly urban guerrilla group planned to attack U.S. and NATO peacekeepers.

Police also arrested a 10th alleged group member in northern Greece Sunday as they continued dismantling an organization that killed four U.S. military officials and 19 other people in 27 years. Thomas Serifis, 36, who worked for the Athens public bus company, was being questioned.

A magistrate on Sunday also arraigned three of the first suspected November 17 terrorists arrested after police achieved their first breakthrough against the group in 27 years after a botched June 29 bombing.

That trio included two brothers, who confessed to nine of the 23 killings attributed to November 17, and a family friend charged with a bombing and robbery. A third brother, injured in the failed bombing, remains hospitalized under police guard.

The Athens daily newspaper Eleftherotypia reported Sunday that the wave of arrests had foiled a plot by November 17 to attack a convoy of NATO peacekeepers driving from the northern port of Thessaloniki to Macedonia and Kosovo.

NATO has more than 30,000 troops in Kosovo, including about 5,000 U.S. soldiers. The force, known as KFOR, uses Thessaloniki as a logistical base.

The paper did not say when November 17 planned to carry out the attack, and police would not comment on the report. The paper said some of those arrested told police about the plot and that evidence was found at one of the November 17 hideouts.

The ambush reportedly was planned for a convoy using a highway leading to the Macedonian border. In informal conversations with police, November 17 suspects said they scouted the highway and found locations "where they planned to strike American forces with rockets and car bombs," Eleftherotypia reported.

"Officials of the anti-terrorist police were left speechless listening to people being held as members of November 17 developing the nightmarish scenario of war," Eleftherotypia reported.

Those arrested so far include an alleged leader of the extreme left-wing group, which bombed, assassinated and robbed with impunity for 27 years. Police still are searching for other members, believed to number a few dozen.

Authorities believe they now are close to dismantling the group, which eluded Greek, American and British authorities since 1975 after killing the CIA station chief in Athens, Richard Welch.

The rabidly anti-American group used guns, bombs and anti-tank rockets to kill – including two Turkish diplomats and Greek businessmen and politicians.

The two suspects charged Sunday were Iraklis Kostaris and Costas Karatsolis, two 36-year-old real estate agents. Kostaris was charged with participating in four killings, including that of U.S. Air Force Sgt. Ronald O. Stewart in March 1991 and British defense attache Brig. Stephen Saunders in June 2000.

Karatsolis, a close friend, was charged with carrying out three armed robberies and participating in the theft of dozens of anti-tank rockets from an army base in central Greece in 1989.

They were arrested in northern Greece over the weekend. The three men arraigned Sunday were Christodoulos Xiros, 44, who police say confessed to nine killings, including those of Stewart and U.S. defense attache Capt. William Nordeen.

His brother, Vassilis, 30, has confessed to two assassinations, including Britain's Saunders, and a string of attacks and robberies.
Both are charged with multiple counts of murder and attempted murder, causing explosions, armed robbery and forming a criminal organization. They face life in prison. Greece does not have the death penalty.

Police say Vassilis Xiros' friend, 26-year-old Dionissis Georgiadis, has confessed to participating in a bombing and a robbery. Of the others in custody, Alexandros Giotopoulos, 58, is believed to be a
group leader. He denies involvement but has been charged with multiple counts of murder and attempted murder.

Another Xiros brother, 40-year-old Savas, remains hospitalized under police guard after being injured in the botched bombing.
His injury provided the clues leading police to alleged November 17 weapons caches and hide-outs. Savas Xiros has not been arrested or charged, but he is believed to have been one of the group's hit men.

© 2002 The Associated Press