3 firebombs explode in Athens; 1 woman wounded

6/3/2013

ATHENS, Greece  — Three firebombs exploded at different locations in central Athens early today, authorities said, with one wounding a woman as she emerged from her apartment.

All three devices consisted of camping gas canisters, police said in a statement.

One exploded at about 8 a.m. in the fifth floor corridor of an apartment building in central Athens, near the political office of the country’s Transparency general secretary, wounding a woman who had just emerged from her apartment. The woman was transferred to a hospital for treatment of slight burns.

The other devices detonated several hours earlier, one outside a building housing the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research and one outside a branch of the Environment, Energy and Climate Change Ministry.

“We strongly condemn the ‘blind’ gas canister attack in the building where the transparency general secretary’s office is housed ... and we wish a speedy recovery to the victim of the cowardly perpetrators,” government spokesman Simos Kedikoglou said in a statement.

“We are sure that the new attempt to introduce violence into public life will be condemned” by all politicians, he said.

Firebomb attacks against government offices, banks or symbols of wealth are common in Greece, where several small, generally anarchist groups operate. The bombings are usually carried out late at night and rarely cause injuries.