Citizen Protection Ministry

Police have released photographs of the arms cache found in a storeroom of an apartment building in the Pangrati district on Tuesday evening.

The cabinet on Monday approved 19,181 new hirings for different state services, of which 4,016 will bolster the beleaguered National Health Service, more than 1,000 will go to education, 1,050 will benefit the Citizen Protection Ministry, and more than 800 will be appointed to firefighting and other related tasks.

The Citizen Protection Ministry is reportedly drafting a bill seeking the radical transformation of the Hellenic Police (ELAS).

The bill will introduce targeted interventions in the structure, organization and operation of ELAS in order to respond more effectively to modern challenges.

A presidential decree establishing a new police directorate, dubbed the "Greek FBI" by high-ranking police and Citizen Protection Ministry officials, was published in the Government Gazette on Thursday.

Citizen Protection Ministry is spearheading a comprehensive reform of disciplinary law for Greece's police force.

In an official announcement, the ministry underscored that "almost sixteen years after the initial implementation of the discipline rules," efforts are underway "to usher the police into a new modern era of restructuring and reorganization."

A new police directorate, specifically tasked to fight organized crime, will be created, probably before the end of the year, officials say.

Citizen Protection Ministry officials are not ruling out the possibility that two military pyrotechnicians who were arrested last week for their involvement in the case of a parcel-bomb that was sent to the president of the Thessaloniki Appeals Court on February 12 may be linked to other terrorist plots, such as the attempted attack on the police riot unit headquarters in Athens last December. 

Investigators are reportedly working on the assumption that the envelope containing explosives that was sent on Monday to the Thessaloniki courthouse addressed to the president of the Court of Appeal was an attempted terrorist attack without, however, correlating the case with the recent strikes at the headquarters of the riot police in Goudi and the Ministry of Labor.

Only four of the country's 25 universities have security plans recognized by the Citizen Protection Ministry and, as recent developments have shown, even these have yet to be implemented. Plans have been drafted by the universities of Patra and Thessaloniki, along with Athens' National Technical University and University of Economics. 

Just seven months after a triumphant reelection, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis proceeded last Wednesday with "corrective moves," alarmed by opinion polls showing that public safety is citizens' second biggest concern after rising prices.