Greek Anarchists Claim Bomb Targeting Italian Diplomat in Solidarity with Imprisoned Comrade
Around 4:00AM on December 2nd an explosion in the garage of an Italian diplomat to Greece, Susanna Schlein, engulfed an official foreign ministry vehicle in flames and damaged another. An improvised incendiary device (IID) had been detonated beneath the car, and a second had failed to explode. No one was injured in the blast. Firefighters on the scene described the intact IID as a “crude” device. Attacks employing both Molotov cocktails as well as IIDs and IEDs (improvised explosive devices) are very common in Greece.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani had a scheduled visit to Athens on the afternoon of December 2nd, from which he was not deterred but which begs the question of whether the militants responsible for the IIDs knew of this. They did not mention the official visit in their claim, though they did make clear that they knew the identity of the diplomat whose house and vehicles were targeted. They also knew her official position within the Italian foreign ministry.
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Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni condemned the attack, saying it was “probably of anarchist origin,” and expressed her support for Schlein. Despite the far-right Italian politician’s personal biases against the far-left and post-left in her own country and abroad, her assumption that anarchist urban guerrillas were behind the attack was reasonable. To begin, this is hardly the first time that Greek anarchists have attacked Italian targets in Greece or even attacked targets in Italy itself.[1] Second, veteran Italian anarchist Alfredo Cospito has been on hunger strike since October 20th in protest over the 41 bis prison regime to which he has been relegated, and which was originally intended for hardcore members of the Mafia; anarchists have been claiming attacks in Cospito’s name internationally from Greece to Germany to a claimed (but unconfirmed) arson as far away as Milwaukie, Oregon. Finally, there were warnings from anarchists themselves, as well as likely warnings from both Greek and Italian intelligence/law enforcement days before the attack. On November 30th, one day before Cospito’s appeal hearing, Greek anarchists splashed red paint on the door of an Italian Chamber of Commerce office in Athens, where they also threw flyers and spray painted the slogan “POWER TO A. COSPITO”.
In their communique, those claiming the attack on Schlein’s home denounce the severe conditions of the 41 bis prison regime, providing context of the historical left-wing struggle in post-World War II Italy alongside that of the contemporary picture in a country governed by a new far-right coalition:
From the actions of the BR/PCC in the ’90s and ’00s, to the attacks of the FAI/IRF and comrade Alfredo Cospito, the revolutionary thread continues to be woven with acts of resistance and emancipation that actively declare that nothing is over, and that revolutionary projects and visions remain relevant and alive in the ranks of the oppressed. And it is this thread, the historical continuity and memory that the fascist Meloni government, and every government before it, wants to silence and eradicate. The Italian state, faced with the archipelago of the revolutionary movement in its territories, has been forced to develop a series of repressive and counterinsurgency tools for decades, of which the 41 bis regime is an evolution.
Of their attack, the communique’s author(s) say simply:
With an eye on the social revolution and internationalist solidarity, we decided to send our own signal of solidarity to the comrade and the struggle against the 41 bis regime. We chose to attack the vehicles of the First Counsellor of the Italian Embassy in her private residence […] We appeared in the night and we disappeared into it, taking an active part in the war we are living. A war in which we have to be on the offensive, demanding justice. By putting forward revolutionary counter-violence and continuous struggle. For the bloodied of war, our brothers and sisters who have not returned home, the oppressed of this land, those who are fighting for a world that holds many worlds. Always for Anarchy.
They sign off with these various slogans:
COMRADE ALFREDO, NO MATTER HOW MUCH THEY TRY TO BURY YOU, WE WILL NEVER FORGET YOU.
VICTORY IN ALFREDO COSPITO’S HUNGER STRIKE
SOLIDARITY WITH THE PRISONERS OF WAR AND COMBATANTS IN THE GREEK HELLHOLES
WE WILL HAVE THE LAST WORD
-“Carlo Giuliani” Vengeance Cell [2]
Alfredo Cospito came up in the robust anarchist scene of Turin, Italy, in the late 1990s. By the early 2000s, he played a central role in the Italian anarchist militant underground and was a key member of the early Informal Anarchist Federation (FAI) cells—most notably the “Scripta Manent Constellation” and the “Olga Nucleus,” among others. In 2012, Cospito shot an Italian nuclear executive in the kneecap—a tactic associated with the previous generation of left-wing guerrillas, particularly among the prominent Red Brigades. He was arrested a few months after and charged with the shooting and was later connected to alleged terrorist activities, including a non-lethal triple bombing in 2007. Cospito has written rather prolifically on topics of anarchism and is an international icon among contemporary anarchists.
Insurrectionist anarchists in Italy have had deep ties to their counterparts in Greece since at least 2008—when a new wave of anarchist violence swept across Greece, following the police shooting of a 15-year-old in Athens, a tragedy which to this day still affects Greek society. The shooting took place on December 6th of that year, perhaps adding even more momentum to the December 2nd attack on the Italian diplomat in 2022. The Italian FAI and the similar Greek anarcho-nihilist urban guerrilla group, Conspiracy Cells of Fire (CCF), are still closely associated with one another, despite the latter being defunct in Greece. Unlike CCF—who are still somewhat active in Latin America and Indonesia—the FAI has been active in Italy recently, even reviving some of the more sophisticated parcel bombing campaigns that we saw from both groups in the early 2000s-2010s. A parcel bomb sent to an Italian defense company in Rome was claimed by the FAI in solidarity with Cospito, about three months prior to the beginning of his hunger strike.
More attacks in the name of Alfredo Cospito are likely to occur in Greece if he remains on hunger strike, especially as his health deteriorates to dangerous levels. The hunger strikes of Greece’s own imprisoned revolutionary icons have recently led to significant violence, both on the streets in clashes with police, as well as clandestinely through militant direct action. Should Cospito abandon his hunger strike today, his name will still appear on banners at marches and in revolutionary communiques claiming attacks, as it has for years preceding this most recent hunger strike.
[1] A 2010 parcel bombing campaign in Rome, which targeted the Swiss and Chilean embassies, was linked to sender destinations in Greece and Greek/Italian FAI connections, likely associated with then-active members of CCF.
[2] Carlo Giuliani was shot and killed in 2001 while allegedly attacking a unit of Carabinieri police with a fire extinguisher at an anti-globalization protest in Genoa, Italy.