{"id":14206,"date":"2026-04-07T01:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-04-07T01:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/07\/seven-arrests-on-chios-over-preparations-for-easter-rocket-war\/"},"modified":"2026-04-07T01:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-04-07T01:48:12","slug":"seven-arrests-on-chios-over-preparations-for-easter-rocket-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/07\/seven-arrests-on-chios-over-preparations-for-easter-rocket-war\/","title":{"rendered":"Seven arrests on Chios over preparations for Easter rocket war"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-1300321\">\n    <!-- .entry-header --><\/p>\n<div class=\"first-img article_thumbnail_wrapper\" itemscope=\"\" itemprop=\"associatedMedia\" itemtype=\"http:\/\/schema.org\/ImageObject\">\n                                                                    <picture><source media=\"(max-width: 767px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Chios-Rocket-War_Shutterstock-320x200.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"960\" height=\"600\" class=\"picture-main-block-image\" data-nxsrc=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Chios-Rocket-War_Shutterstock.jpg\" alt=\"Seven arrests on Chios over preparations for Easter rocket war\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Chios-Rocket-War_Shutterstock.jpg\"\/><br \/>\n                        <\/source><\/picture>\n                                                        <\/div>\n<div class=\"entry-content\" itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p>Police on the eastern Aegean Sea island of Chios have arrested seven people who were injured in a fire at an illegal fireworks workshop ahead of an iconic local tradition in which hundreds of rockets are fired during Easter celebrations.<\/p>\n<p>A police statement Monday said the suspects \u2013 six men and a woman \u2013 face charges of breaking laws on fireworks and flares, as well as negligent arson.<\/p>\n<p>All seven suffered burns late Sunday, and five required hospital treatment, after ingredients they were using to build homemade rockets for Saturday night\u2019s event at the village of Vrontados accidentally ignited.<\/p>\n<p>The spectacular Easter custom known as the \u201crocket war\u201d involves youths from two rival parishes in Vrontados setting up camps on elevated positions and aiming rows of rockets at church towers, which have been boarded up in advance as have other nearby buildings.<\/p>\n<p>They use homemade fireworks consisting of gunpowder-filled tubes attached to sticks that are fired from prepared, tilted bases.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the event being widely advertized as a tourist draw, police have cracked down on the preparations, seizing hundreds of rockets found stashed in several locations.<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, officers confiscated 30 kilograms of chemicals used to fill the fireworks, as well as assorted rocket-making paraphernalia.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><!-- .entry-content --><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script>\n        var NXFBPixelFunc = function () {\n            document.removeEventListener(\"scroll\", NXFBPixelFunc);\n            setTimeout(function () {\n                !function (f, b, e, v, n, t, s) {\n                    if (f.fbq) return;\n                    n = f.fbq = function () {\n                        n.callMethod ?\n                            n.callMethod.apply(n, arguments) : n.queue.push(arguments)\n                    };\n                    if (!f._fbq) f._fbq = n;\n                    n.push = n;\n                    n.loaded = !0;\n                    n.version = '2.0';\n                    n.queue = [];\n                    t = b.createElement(e);\n                    t.async = !0;\n                    t.src = v;\n                    s = b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n                    s.parentNode.insertBefore(t, s)\n                }(window, document, 'script',\n                    'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n                fbq('init', '109138906120213');\n                fbq('track', 'PageView');\n            }, 0)\n        };\n        document.addEventListener(\"scroll\", NXFBPixelFunc);\n    <\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/news\/1300321\/seven-arrests-on-chios-over-preparations-for-easter-rocket-war\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Police on the eastern Aegean Sea island of Chios have arrested seven people who were injured in a fire at an illegal fireworks workshop ahead of an iconic local tradition in which hundreds of rockets are fired during Easter celebrations. A police statement Monday said the suspects \u2013 six men and a woman \u2013 face &#8230; <\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more-container\"><a title=\"Seven arrests on Chios over preparations for Easter rocket war\" class=\"read-more button\" href=\"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/2026\/04\/07\/seven-arrests-on-chios-over-preparations-for-easter-rocket-war\/#more-14206\" aria-label=\"Read more about Seven arrests on Chios over preparations for Easter rocket war\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14207,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.ekathimerini.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/Chios-Rocket-War_Shutterstock.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","no-featured-image-padding"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14206\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14207"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/in-greece.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}