Alex Trelinski
THE Policia Nacional have arrested a former Vitoria City Council official for sending six letter bombs late last year.
The 74-year-old Spaniard was detained on Wednesday on a Mirando de Ebro street, in the Castilla y Leon region.
Police and bomb experts have searched his home.
On Monday, US Pentagon sources were quoted by the New York Times as saying that an extremist Russian group was behind the bombs at the behest of Russian intelligence.
Wednesday’s arrest contradicts that report with the Policia Nacional investigation indicating that the man acted alone and had no ties to any group.
The letter bomb recipients included Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez and the US and Ukraine embassies in Madrid.
Police from the outset focused their probe on the Castilla y Leon region with the letters arriving from Burgos Province at a Correos centre in Valladolid, before being forwarded to their final destinations.
A big clue in finding the sender’s identity was that he used commemorative stamps of Monte Santa Trega in Pontevedra with a limited issue of just 135,000.
The stamps were only distributed to main Correos offices and police combed through security camera footage to identify their suspect.
