Police may have identified those who planted an incendiary device that failed to explode on an Athens metro train on Saturday after viewing CCTV footage from the public transport network, sources told Kathimerini on Tuesday.
A Citizens’ Protection Ministry official who wished to remain anonymous said that police have been examining video of the platform and other areas of Aegaleo metro station, where the device was found, and have singled out some suspects. The source did not state how many people the police said were involved in the would-be attack. Another ministry source suggested that some useful forensic evidence was found but that efforts to connect it with evidence gathered at the sites of terrorist attacks in the past had not yet yielded any results.
Officially, the police denied that any breakthrough had been made in forensic tests. The device was left in a bag on the train that traveled between Ethniki Amyna and Aegaleo stations. It was found by the driver, who checked the carriages at the end of the journey. Anti-terrorist squad sources said that the assailants may have links to the Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire, an urban guerrilla group that carried out a series of bloodless bomb attacks before most of the members were arrested in 2009 and 2010. Officers have not ruled out the possibility that the suspects were members of the group.
Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire had claimed an arson attack on a Kifissia-Piraeus electric railway (ISAP) train in March 2009 at Kifissia station. A previously unknown group calling itself Urban Guerrilla War (Antartiko Poleon) claimed on Monday that it planted the device. However, police sources said that they would wait to see if this group produces a proclamation before they can treat the claim seriously.
Source: Kathimerini