SYRIZA MP accused of offending victims of 2010 arson attack

Greece’s conservative opposition on Wednesday slammed SYRIZA MP Giorgos Kyritsis for offending the victims of a deadly firebomb attack on a branch of Marfin Bank in central Athens during anti-austerity riots in May 2010.

New Democracy was reacting to Kyritsis's defense of government plans to change the country’s criminal code that would reduce the manufacture and possession of homemade firebombs from a felony to a misdemeanor, in which the leftist MP said that “in the 30 or more years that I worked as a journalist I do not recollect anyone being killed by a Molotov cocktail.”

“The only thing Kyritsis has not tried to tell the families of the Marfin bank victims is that their people died because of a short-circuit,” ND said in a statement. “He should be nothing but ashamed of himself.”

SYRIZA deputies' “insolence knows no limits,” the opposition party added.

Three bank workers, including a pregnant woman, died of smoke inhalation while becoming trapped in the flaming building, as rescuers were prevented from approaching the location by protesters throwing projectiles at emergency response units and blocking access.