[ALBSA-Info] Kathimerini

[Agron Alibali]

Bomb damages patriarch's office in central Athens

ICON 
A billboard advertising a popular singer's nightclub show is an odd backdrop for a poster by Orthodox fringe groups denouncing the visit of Pope John Paul II to Athens next Friday and Saturday. The poster proclaims: 'Out with the beast, the Pope of Rome 666! The arch-heretic who is welcomed by his collaborator, Anti-Christodoulos.' Archbishop Christodoulos has come under fire since the Holy Synod gave its grudging approval for the papal visit. Protest rallies are planned for April 25 and 30. 
A small anarchist group, one of several that cause damage to property with home-made explosive devices in order to make a political statement, yesterday claimed responsibility for an explosion at the Athens office of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. The explosion, caused by four gas canisters set off by a rag fuse, burned the wooden doors of the neoclassical building on Kolonaki's quiet Neophytou Douka Street. Coming just six days before the first visit to Greece by the pope, the explosion set off reverberations far greater than the damage it caused. 
A caller told the newspaper Eleftherotypia that a group called the Anti-Establishment Struggle claimed responsibility for the blast which occurred at 3.50 p.m. He mentioned Pope John Paul's planned visit to Athens. He did not explain why the patriarchate office had been targeted. But in the week before Easter, Ecumenical Patriarch Vartholomaios, in comments to Greek journalists whom he had invited to Istanbul, had expressed support for the pope's visit, accusing those of opposing it of displaying "ecclesiastical provincialism." This was seen as a barb against the Church of Greece which has voiced its misgivings over the papal visit while calling on Orthodox groups not to cause a disturbance. 
Archbishop Christodoulos's spokesman condemned the bombing. "We condemn in the most categorical way such activities, especially when they are aimed at the Mother Church," said Haris Konidaris. 
Government spokesman Dimitris Reppas also condemned what he called a "terrorist attack." "This revolting act is aimed against Hellenism in its entirety, of which the Patriarchate of Constantinople is the spiritual peak. We Greek citizens treat in a united and decisive way all those forces which try to promote such antidemocratic and anti-Greek plans," he said. 
The Patriarchate itself, in the Phanar district of Istanbul, has been damaged in the past by bombs set off by Islamic militants.



---------------------------------
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Auctions - buy the things you want at great prices
-------------- next part --------------
HTML attachment scrubbed and removed