Last key N17 member surrenders

Saunders: N17's last victim

ATHENS, Greece -- Greece's most wanted fugitive and believed leader of the terror group November 17 has surrendered after walking into an Athens police station.

Dimitris Koufodinas is the last of the key members of N17 to be arrested following a crackdown by Greek police earlier in the year.

Greek police say all the core members of the radical left-wing group are now being detained.

Authorities began questioning Koufodinas shortly after he gave himself up at the Greek Police Headquarters in central Athens on Thursday after weeks on the run.

A spokesman told reporters: "Dimitris Koufodinas gave himself up of his own accord at Greek Police Headquarters in central Athens at 2:35 p.m. today.

"He is being held and questioned by the prosecutor responsible for investigating terrorism."

The 45-year-old beekeeper is wanted in connection with a number of killings and is regarded as the head of the group's hit squads which have killed 23 people since 1975.

MORE STORIES • N17: Decades of terror

The victims included British, U.S. and Turkish diplomats as well as U.S. CIA chief Richard Welch.

The suspect is considered to be November 17's main recruiter, its most elusive member and a liaison between the group's leaders and gunmen.

At one stage the police had suggested Koufodinas had slipped abroad.

Since the end of June, police have arrested and charged 15 suspects of November 17. Before then nobody connected to the group had been arrested.

Greek authorities have been under pressure in the run-up to the 2004 Athens Olympic Games to record a success.

The initial breakthrough came when a November 17 attempted bomb attack went wrong in June.

The police were then helped when the alleged bombhandler, Savas Xiros, admitted to having gunned down British diplomat Brigadier Stephen Saunders as he was driving to his country's embassy on June 8, 2000.

The alleged founder and mastermind of the group, Alexandros Giotopoulos, is being held along with 15 other suspects at a maximum security prison.

Suspects in custody have implicated Koufodinas in dozens of attacks and murders blamed on November 17.

N17 is named after the 1973 date when Greece's military junta quelled a student uprising.

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