An investigative journalist who has become a key witness in the scandal over why two of Greece’s top athletes withdrew from the Athens Olympics has been stabbed and beaten with crowbars, in what his editor has called an ”assassination attempt”.
Filippos Sirigos has testified that sprinters Costas Kenteris and Katerina Thanou, both gold medal hopes, staged a motorcycle accident to avoid a drug test on the eve of the games.
The assault, which occurred as Sirigos left a radio station, provoked a storm of protest. His editor, Serafim Fintanidis said: ”This was an attempt to kill him. This was not an attack to scare him.”
The Greek prime minister, Costas Karamanlis, described it as an attack on ”freedom of expression and journalistic investigations”.
The assailants, who disguised themselves beneath motorcycle helmets, ambushed Sirigos — who is the sports editor of the newspaper Eleftherotypia — on Monday afternoon after he had finished presenting his regular radio show. He was stabbed several times and battered.
Sirigos (55) underwent surgery and was on Tuesday reported to be in a stable condition suffering from stomach and head wounds.
Police said on Tuesday night gas canisters and a bottle of petrol had also been sent to the home of his newspaper’s owner, Christos Tegopoulos.
Police said there was no clear motive for either attack nor a clear link but that the anonymous package was a warning to the publisher.
The timing heightened suspicions that the attack on Sirigos was intended to intimidate or eliminate a key witness in one of the country’s most humiliating sports scandals.
This week state prosecutors are due to release findings into the investigation that may lead to charges against Greece’s top two sprinters and their coach, who withdrew at short notice from August’s Olympics after a missed doping test. Kenteris and Thanou had been favourites to win medals at the Athens games.
Sirigos had given evidence that they faked a motorcycle accident to get out of taking a doping test.
Last month Kenteris appeared before Greek prosecutors for a seven-hour examination. He insisted he did not know he was wanted for drug testing and claimed that he and Thanou had left the Olympic village to go to their coach’s house.
There they had heard on television of the search for them and had got on a motorbike to return to the village but had an accident on the way. One man has already been jailed for giving false evidence that he saw the accident.
The sprinters’ coach, Christos Tsekos, has been under investigation as officials try to establish whether he misused public funds. The Greek Parliament has been sent a report alleging that €1,5-million earmarked to help promote sports development had been given to a sports club owned by Tsekos.
Last month Tsekos’s appearance before the investigation was delayed so that he could produce more documents about food supplements confiscated from his company’s warehouses.
Kenteris was a surprise winner of gold in the 200m at the 2000 Sydney games where Thanou won silver in the women’s 100m.
At the Athens Olympics, Greek fans in the stadium showed their support for Kenteris by booing those athletes who made it to the 200 metres final.
Other political leaders joined condemnation of what was believed to be the first such attack on a journalist for decades. The incident was also debated in parliament.
The executive board of the Athens Journalists’ Union said the attack was ”cowardly and criminal”.
It was, their statement added, intended ”to take the life of the journalist” and ”create a climate of terrorism for all those journalists who persist in seeking the truth”.
Last month Sirigos was sued for libel by the head of the Athens games, Gianna Angelopoulos, and her husband.
They have demanded €10-million in compensation after stories alleging her involvement in Olympics-sponsoring programmes through a company.
After the country basked in international acclaim for winning Euro 2004 and for hosting the successful Olympics, the attack has exposed the state of Greece’s own domestic sports.
The government has pledged to root out the long-standing problems in sports by increasing punishment for hooligans, corrupt sports officials and debt-ridden football clubs which do not pay their players. – Guardian Unlimited