An online leak of the names of hundreds of staff of a new much-touted Greek anti-crime unit has put the officers’ lives at risk, the police said Thursday.
The leak on a specialist news website had compromised the identity of some 550 officers who were to be transferred to the new agency, according to the Ta Nea daily.
Dubbed the “Greek FBI”, the force had been highly trumpeted by the government as a response to organised crime amid a spate of mob killings.
“By publicising the names of these people, there is even a risk to their lives,” police spokeswoman Constantia Dimoglidou told Antenna TV on Thursday, adding that an internal investigation had been launched into the leak.
Police and crime news website lawandorder.gr on Wednesday acknowledged it had posted “the names of officers who will staff the ‘Greek FBI’ by mistake”.
The new unit of around 1,000 officers has absorbed several directorates including the economic crimes, narcotics, human trafficking, hooliganism and organised crime squads.
“Greek society needs it to fight against a form of violence… that rakes huge economic sums,” police minister Michalis Chrysochoidis said earlier this month.
In the past two years, several prominent mobsters have died in ongoing criminal underworld wars, with some of the killings taking place in broad daylight.
In July, a topographer was shot dead in his car near a busy Athens street, with the murder attributed to real estate disputes on the glitzy island of Mykonos.
Last year, Greece’s police were badly embarrassed when dozens of Dinamo Zagreb hooligans drove through the country unchallenged and clashed with AEK Athens fans in the capital, leaving one dead.
The killing is unresolved, as is the murder of prominent crime reporter Giorgos Karaivaz outside his home in 2021.
Two men arrested for the murder were acquitted for lack of evidence in July.
Source: AFP
