Three Suspected Members of Greek Radical Group Arrested

Three suspected members of a radical Greek anarchist group known as "Conspiracy of Cells of Fire" were arrested outside of Athens, police said in a statement Sunday.

The woman and two men arrested were being investigated over firebomb attacks on state targets.

The attacks are believed to have been retribution for the jailing of several of the group's members over strikes on targets in Athens.

The arrests come in the wake of the January 3 arrest of Christodoulos Xiros, a convicted hitman for the notorious November 17 underground group who vanished in 2014 while on leave from prison, where he was serving multiple life sentences for deadly attacks.

Before its breakup in 2002, November 17 was one of Greece's most violent far-left organizations, claiming responsibility for 23 assassinations during its 27-year span, including the 1975 killing of the CIA's Athens station chief, Richard Welch. 

Members of the "Conspiracy of Cells of Fire group had declared solidarity with Xiros prior to his flight, and claimed responsibility for a parcel bomb sent to a police station in Itea three months after his disappearance.

DNA discovered on that bomb -- which was defused before it could explode -- matched traces found in the car Xiros used to flee.

Since recapturing Xiros, police had charged him with "leading a terrorist organization" thought to have been preparing an attack on maximum-security Korydallos prison -- and amassing eight Kalashnikov rifles, rocket propelled grenades, several kilos of explosives and bomb-making materials in the process. 

As he'd done in videos released on the run mocking government officials with warnings of looming violence, Xiros left his January 5 arraignment warning "the revolution will happen whether they like it or not."

Police did not indicate if the three suspects arrested Sunday had been implicated in the group involved in Xiros' most recent underground activity.