Police on Thursday defused a mail bomb sent to a maximum security prison in Athens where alleged members of an armed anarchist group are on trial, authorities said.
The parcel was sent to the governor of Korydallos prison in western Athens. Prison authorities determined that the package was suspicious after scanning it, police said in a statement.
The padded envelop had Italian postage stamps but no postmark, the statement said. As senders address it listed that of the four-nation military alliance, Eurofor, based in Florence, Italy.
Nine suspected members of the armed Greek anarchist group Revolutionary Nuclei of Fire are currently on trial at a court set up inside Korydallos prison, for their alleged role in bombings and other attacks. The group has claimed responsibility for a spate of parcel bombings last November, that targeted embassies and even reached the office of German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Police officials said the device, hidden inside a CD case and rigged using a 9-volt battery, was identical to letter bombs used by the violent Italian anarchist group FAI, or Informal Anarchist Federation.
FAI claimed responsibility for the December embassy attacks in Rome.
In Italy, a package bomb exploded shortly after 4 p.m. at the barracks of a parachute brigade in Livorno, wounding a senior officer, while another letter bomb exploded later at an office of the Swiss nuclear power industry in the northern city of Olten, wounding two people.
Authorities haven't drawn a link between the incidents, but Italian news reports citing unidentified sources said Italian investigators believed they were connected.
Greece's police Thursday urged state-run services and mail deliver companies to remain vigilant to more possible mail-bomb attacks.
(AP)
