Deputy Citizen’s Protection [Public Order] Minister Katerina Papakosta responded to the failed pressure cooker bomb attack outside the home of Deputy Supreme Court Prosecutor Isidoros Dogiakos with a call for calm and prudence in addressing issues pertaining to security.
In a post on her Facebook wall, Papakosta stated that, “I issued a plea to everyone, in this sensitive period to operate with measured speech on Security issues. I was not heeded, because some people refuse to cross the Rubicon. Let them assume the responsibility.”
The statement appeared to be an indirect reference to government complacency in the face of anarchist attacks.
New Democracy, the party from which Papakosta was expelled by Kyriakos Mitsotakis, charged that the Citizen’s Protection Ministry has been transformed into the Rouvikonas Protection Ministry.
Many opposition parties, political pundits and analysts maintain that the left-wing SYRIZA-led government has ordered police not to arrest members of the group in most circumstances. SYRIZA considers Rouvikonas members as political activists, despite forays at foreign embassies and public buildings.
The reference to the anarchist group Rouvikonas (Rubicon) comes after various incidents involving members of the group, such as forcing plainclothes policemen who were standing outside the home of a leading div in the group, to show their IDs.
About 40 hooded members of an anti-authority group inside a courtroom at Athens’ lower court attacked and seriously injured three policemen. The cause was that policemen were testifying at a trial of members of an anti-authority group which engaged in violent attacks at an anti-fascist demonstration in September, 2012.
The police union asserted that the policemen contacted top brass and were instructed to defuse the situation and not make arrests. One of the attackers said “Snitches, fascists, we will slaughter you.”
