Greece’s Supreme Court prosecutor has moved to annul the judicial council decision that freed Alexandros Giotopoulos, the convicted leader of the November 17 terrorist organization, just days after his conditional release.
Deputy Supreme Court Prosecutor Sofoklis Logothetis, who reviewed the case file, concluded that Giotopoulos was wrongly released because he has not served the full 25-year prison term required by law. Logothetis also determined that the substantive conditions for releasing a multiple life-sentence convict had not been met and that the content of the ruling justifying his release had not changed sufficiently to warrant it.
Supreme Court President will now appoint a judicial council to rule on the prosecutor’s recommendation. If the council accepts it, Giotopoulos will be returned to prison. The council is expected to be convened in the first days of June.
Giotopoulos, 81, was released on May 21 under restrictive conditions after five applications for parole, the first four having been rejected. He is required to remain at his home in Vyronas, a suburb of Athens, report regularly to his local police station, and is banned from leaving the country. Since 2022 he had been granted regular furloughs, all of which he observed.
November 17, known in Greece as “17N,” was a far-left urban guerrilla organization that carried out assassinations, bombings, and robberies from 1975 until its dismantling in 2002. Giotopoulos, born in Paris in 1944 and known within the organization by the alias “Lambros,” was arrested in July 2002 on the island of Lipsoi by the Greek counterterrorism service. He was convicted as a moral instigator in 17 murders as well as bombings, robberies, and membership in the organization, charges he has consistently denied, claiming he was implicated by co-defendants seeking favorable treatment.
He was sentenced to 17 consecutive life terms plus 25 years in prison.
