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A year after the big protest against the signing of the Memorandum of financial support during which anarchists set fire to a branch of Marfin Bank with Molotov cocktails in downtown Athens and killed three people the police are ready to submit the report to the judicial authorities.

In a statement for the Vima newspaper, a senior officer from the Ministry for Citizens Protection said that "the time has come the justice to decide on the data we gathered for the five anarchists." According to him, the meeting point of the young people who caused the tragedy in the bank is located in the Exarchia neighbourhood which is preferred by these circles. Most of the data are extracted from video recordings and the testimony of eyewitnesses. "We will send a large folder to the judicial authorities in the coming days which will decide whether to prosecute the five anarchists."

The police authorities analyzed more than 90 videos filmed by police and shops’ cameras located on central boulevards in Athens. They show the actions of the main suspects of the arson. Meanwhile, the police took the statements of 70 witnesses, and has created in recent months a network to trace the suspects and their phone calls in order to prove their involvement in the attack on the bank.

It is expected within the coming weeks the prosecutor George Kaloudis who investigated the lack of fire protection measures in the bank branch to initiate criminal proceedings against the suspects. The prosecutor asked the police for additional information about the actions and injuries to other employees who succeeded to escape the fire.

The tragic event was investigated by a department of civilian police in cooperation with crime laboratories. The experts have analyzed the activities before and after the attack of a group of anarchists, which squeezed in the protest march in day of the Panhellenic strike. They managed to find five people who had a leading role in the arson of the bank and participated in two consecutive attacks in a bookshop and a shoe shop.  

They say from the police that the investigation is conducted systematically by comparing data from videos and eyewitness. "Some of the faces of the suspects appear relatively clear in some videos. We compared them with photos of suspicious persons from previous interceptions of anarchists. We have been following them for months and were waiting to make a "fatal" error and to "show" us their links." Although the police gathered significant information  the police officers still recognize that the procedure for initiating criminal proceedings based on visual materials and identification of suspects from photographs is often quite difficult.

The folder also contains data of internal disputes among the anarchists concerning the bank fire and the death of three employees, which have provided data on the identity of the perpetrators.

The second part of the investigation concerns the responsibility for the inadequacy of fire protection measures in the bank. According to the labour inspection report issued in July 2010, in their attempts to escape the fire the 27 employees of the Bank have found themselves in an iron cage. The only emergency exit was locked and the remote control that opens it was lost. The tragedy would have been even greater if a door had not been opened, which the employees used as ventilation against the bad smell coming from one of the toilets in the bank.