GREEK JOURNALISTS SENTENCED FOR USING TAPES OF WIRETAP

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00845R000100360006-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 16, 2010
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: April 27, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/16: CIA-RDP90-00845
NEW YORK TIMES
P~ ,~q ? 27 April, 1985
'PH AO
Greek JJ ourralists Sentenced
For Using Tapes of Wiretap
ATHENS, April 26 (AP) - The pub-
lisher and the editor of the newspaper
with the largest circulation in Greece
were sentenced Thursday to five
months' imprisonment on charges aris-
ing from the wiretapping of an office
used by The New York Times in
Athens.
STAT
R000100360006-2
Ethnos had asserted that the conver-
sation it published proved that Mr.
Anastasiades was planning to murder
Ethnos employees and destabilize
Greek democracy. After reviewing the
conversations, the court dismissed the
assertions.
In several articles, the newspaper
Anastasiades
at Mr
.
George Bobolas, 59 years old, the had assert
book
publisher of the daily Ethnos, was sen- was a C.I.A. a ent and his
tenced in absentia after he did not. ap- was the proauct of a "cold war attack
peal in court, citing poor health. The ?n Greece.- r. Anasta
e
editor, Alexander Filipopoulos, 57, was coun with a libel suit against th
in court and pleaded , not guilty. news r.
The court ruled that the two could The court president ruled that expla-
avoid going to jail by paying a fine nations Mr. Bobolas and Mr. Filipopou-
equivalent to about $500 each. If they los had offered of how they had re-
want to appeal the conviction, the court ceived the tapes were "not very con-
said; they can remain free pending a vincing," but that there was insuffi-
ruling cient evidence that they had ordered
The two were convicted of making the wiretapping.,.
illegal use of telephone conversations. Ethnos had reported that it had
The pourt acquitted the two men of car- "tens" of such tapes and that the tapes
rying out the wiretapping themselves, had been mailed to the newspaper
saying there was insufficient evidence anonymously, "obviously by members
of this of Anastasiades's group of agents who
apparently disagreed with the murder-
Two-Year Legal Battle ous plans of their bosses and decided to
warn us against the intentions of this
If+ convicted on the wiretapping ruthless group."
charge, the two could have faced terms `vegan and Crude Attempt'
of five years in prison.
The* sentences were handed down Mr. Anastasiades told the Athens
after a two-year legal battle between court the incident "constituted a vulgar
Ethnos and Paul Anastasiades, 34, a and crude attempt by Ethnos to dis-
Cypriot journalist who writes under the credit me personally as well as my
name Paul Anastasi. He is a corre- revelations on the paper's connections
spondent for The Daily Telegraph of with the K.G.B."
London and a part-time correspondent Some months ago, the counsel for the
for The New York Times. prosecution argued that the Russians
Ethnos published Mr. Anastasiades's had probably tapped the telephones of
conversations with an Athens lawyer in The New York Times's office and had
July 1983, a year after the journalist handed the tapes over for exploitation
published a book in which he said Eth- by Ethnos. The New York Times,
nos was published in cooperation with which has its own correspondent based
the disinformation department of the in Athens, rents office space from Mr.
K.G.B., the Soviet state security agen- Anastasiades in the same suite in
cy. Mr. Anastasiades was later sen- which he has his office.
tenced to prison on charges of libel and The two sides are to confront each
defamation of Mr. Bobolas, but he ap- other again on May 16. Mr. Bobolas is
pealed and the sentence was annulled seeking about $400,000 as compensation
last November by the Greek Supreme for libel he says Mr. Anastasiades com-
Court, which ordered a new hearing. mitted in his book, "Take the Nation in
In the wiretapping case, the court Your Hands."
president, Ioannis.Velissaris, rejected Mr. Anastasiades has countered with
the defense's claim that the newspaper a libel suit for about $1.6 million as
had published the wiretapped conver- damages for the wiretapping and for
sations "as a national and social duty" the articles that have presented him as
to expose a "conspiracy." . a' foreign agent and terrorist.
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/06/16: CIA-RDP90-00845R000100360006-2