A self-styled eco-terrorist who planted a viable homemade bomb in a popular public park in central Edinburgh has been jailed for more than eight years.
Nikolaos Karvounakis, originally from the Greek island of Crete, had placed the improvised device packed with 58 nails and sections of metal pipe in a shelter at Princes Street Gardens in January 2018.
Written on the flap inside the box were the words “fuck you all”. The device included low grade explosive, and a primitive but disconnected fuse made from a light filament and a battery.
Army explosives experts believed that had it been made operational or accidentally detonated, it would have been capable of causing significant injuries, the high court in Edinburgh heard. Karvounakis later claimed to be linked to a fringe group accused of eco-terrorism which originated in Mexico.
It took nearly two years before Karvounakis, 35, a former Greek national serviceman, was arrested. In December 2020 Police Scotland counter-terrorism officers received intelligence from European counterparts linking him to the offence. DNA taken from tape used in the device was found to belong to him.
Six weeks after the device was found, the Edinburgh Evening News received an email headed “International Terrorist Group in UK”. It contained a link to an extremist website where Karvounakis had anonymously claimed responsibility with a picture of the device and signed “Misanthropos Cacogen”.
Speaking for the prosecution, Angela Gray, the advocate depute, said Karvounakis claimed to be a “lover of nihilist anti-political violence” and to support an anarchist terror group Individualidades Tendiendo a lo Salvaje. The group has been blamed for bombing a nano-technology lab in Mexico City in 2011 that seriously injured a robotics researcher.
Gray told the court: “This is known as ITS, an abbreviation of a Spanish phrase translating to ‘individualists tending to the wild’. This Mexican terrorist organisation was formed during 2011. The group focuses on eco-terrorism, which involves acts of violence committed against people and or property in support of environmental causes.”
John Scullion QC, Karvounakis’s defence counsel, said he had been struggling with anxiety and low self-esteem, and had spent increasing amounts of time online. There he had drifted into conversations with extremists, whose beliefs he now repudiated.
Scullion said his client, who pleaded guilty to an offence under the Terrorism Act, had intended to cause disruption but had not planned to injure people, so had left the detonator unconnected. “It is fair to say he now bitterly regrets what he did and will bitterly regret it for the rest of his life,” Scullion told the court.
Lord Braid jailed Karvounakis for eight years and four months, and said he would have been jailed for 10 years had he not admitted his guilt and had no previous convictions.
“The offence involved a high degree of culpability on your part as shown by the significant degree of planning,” the judge said. “Afterwards you appeared to exult in the commission in your claim of responsibility.”
Det Chief Supt Stuart Houston, Police Scotland’s head of counter-terrorism, said: “The ideological beliefs held by Karvounakis were unusual.
“His reckless actions showed utter disregard for the safety of anyone within Princes Street Gardens [and] there is no doubt his presence and engagement online after the event could have easily encouraged others to carry out similar acts, with potentially catastrophic consequences. Not just in Scotland.”
