January 06, 2009	Tuesday	Muharram 08, 1430

ATHENS, Jan 5: A Greek policeman was seriously injured on Monday in a shooting that police say marks the return of the country’s most dangerous far-left extremist group following nearly a month of youth unrest.

Officer Diamantis Matzounis was seriously wounded on Monday when unknown gunmen opened fire on his patrol with weapons, including a Kalashnikov rifle, a submachine gun and a grenade, said Greek police chief Vassilis Tsiatouras.

Matzounis was in “critical but stable” condition after an emergency operation for multiple injuries, Greek Health Minister Dimitris Avramopoulos told journalists.

Police said the submachine gun used in the early morning attack had been used in a previous action claimed by the far-left group Revolutionary Struggle, which in 2007 had fired a rocket at the US embassy.

The investigation has been assigned to Greece’s anti-terror squad who found some 40 cartridge cases at the scene, including 27 from a Kalashnikov rifle and four from the submachine gun linked to the Revolutionary Struggle.

The nine-millimetre submachine gun was used in an April 2007 attack on a police station in the northern Athens district of Nea Ionia, three months after an anti-tank rocket strike against the US embassy in January.—AFP