Costas Georgiou

Costas Georgiou was a British paratrooper and mercenary.

Georgious served in 1 Battalion, Parachute Regiment until he and a colleague Michael Wainhouse were convicted of robbing a Belfast Post Office, using army weapons. They were sentenced to 5 years imprisonment.

Following their release Georgiou and Wainhouse linked up with two other former paratroopers, Georgiou's cousin Charles Christodolou and Nicholas Mervyn Hall. In 1975, Hall advertised his services as a freelance soldier in the press, and the other three were among those who responded.

The group made contact with the FNLA, and was given a mission in central London as a loyalty test. Hall refused this, but Georgiou complied and set fire to the offices of the Mozambique and Guinea Information Centre on 12 Little Newport Street on 6 November 1975.

Angola

The four arrived in Angola in December 1975, where Georgiou renamed himself "Colonel Callan" after a television character of the time.

Tony Geraghty records that Callan, "his fellow assasin Sammy Copeland and their inner ring of ex-para psychopaths - the mercenary advance guard - killed people as a mundane, daily process".

Maquela

At Maquela, on 2 February 1976, Callan shot dead 22-year-old ex-soldier Phil Davies for firing a rocket at a mercenary vehicle by mistake. He then presided over the slaughter of between 11 and 14 men from the second wave of mercenaries, who were taken to a valley and told to start running at which point Georgiou's colleague's picked them off.

External Resources

• NameBase GEORGIU COSTA
• 1976: Mercenaries trial begins in Angola, On this Day - 11 June, BBC News, accessed 29 June 2010.
• 1976: Death sentence for mercenaries, On This Day - 28 June, BBC News, accessed 29 June 2010.
• ANGOLA: Death for 'War Dogs', Time magazine, 12 July 1976.