Parcel bombs hit two more embassies in Greece

Anti-terrorism police escort a mail bomb suspect to the public prosecutor's office in AthensPhoto: AP,

A far-Left terrorist group was suspected of being behind the attacks. The mail bombs exploded outside the Swiss and Russian embassies in Athens, while similar packages sent to the embassies of Germany, Bulgaria and Chile were blown up in controlled explosions.

In Berlin, a suspicious package was found in the mailroom of Mrs Merkel's office, and was being tested for explosives.German newspapers cited unspecified official sources as saying the package was personally addressed to Mrs Merkel and the Greek Economy Ministry was given as the return address.

The wave of parcel bombs came a day after police arrested two men on suspicion of trying to post four parcel bombs to French President Nicolas Sarkozy and the Mexican, Dutch and Belgian embassies.

The men, one of whom wore body armour, a wig and a baseball cap, were armed with Glock handguns and bullets in waist pouches.

One of them, aged 22, was wanted in connection with an investigation into a radical anarchist group called the Conspiracy in the Cells of Fire, which is believed to be trying to cause unrest in the wake of Greece's severe economic crisis.

It first emerged in 2008 and has since claimed responsibility for a spate of small bomb and arson attacks.

Attacks by radical left-wing and anarchist groups have increased since Dec 2008, when police fatally shot a teenager in Exarchia, an Athens neighbourhood with a history of political militancy.

Greece has been plagued by domestic terrorism for decades, much of it a legacy of the sharp post-war divide between Left and Right and the country's civil war.

"Such appalling, unacceptable acts are condemned by the entire Greek people," said Filipos Petsalnikos, the speaker of parliament.

"Democracy cannot be terrorised." The bomb attacks come ahead of this weekend's local and regional elections, seen as a referendum on the Socialist government's austerity packages, which include pension freezes, tax increases and spending cuts.

(source:telegraph.co.uk)