M.S.S. v. BELGIUM AND GREECE JUDGMENT 55 that he had to go to the Attica police headquarters to register his address. He had not done so because he had had no address to register. He had been convinced that having an address was a condition for the procedure to be set in motion. He had subsequently presented himself, in vain, at the police headquarters on several occasions, where he had had to wait for hours, so far without any prospect of his situation being clarified. 270. Secondly, the applicant believed that he had escaped being sent back to his own country only because of the interim measure indicated by the Court to the Greek Government. Apart from that “protection”, he had no guarantee at this stage that his asylum procedure would follow its course. Even if it did, the procedure offered no guarantee that the merits of his fears would be seriously examined by the Greek authorities. He argued that he did not have the wherewithal to pay for a lawyer’s services, that there was no provision for legal aid at this stage, that first-instance interviews were known to be superficial, that he would not have the opportunity to lodge an appeal with a body competent to examine the merits of his fears, that an appeal to the Supreme Administrative Court did not automatically have suspensive effect and that the procedure was a lengthy one. According to him, the almost non-existent record of cases where the Greek authorities had granted international protection of any kind whatsoever at first instance or on appeal showed how ineffective the procedure was. 2. The Greek Government 271. The Greek Government submitted that the applicant had not suffered the consequences of the alleged shortcomings in the asylum procedure and could therefore not be considered as a victim for the purposes of the Convention. 272. The applicant’s attitude had to be taken into account: he had, in breach of the legislation, failed to cooperate with the authorities and had shown no interest in the smooth functioning of the procedure. By failing to report to the Attica police headquarters in June 2009 he had failed to comply with the formalities for initiating the procedure and had not taken the opportunity to inform the police that he had no address, so that they could notify him of any progress through another channel. Furthermore, he had assumed different identities and had attempted to leave Greece while hiding from the authorities the fact that he had applied for asylum there. 273. The Government considered that the Greek authorities had followed the statutory procedure in spite of the applicant’s negligence and the errors of his ways. They argued in particular that this was illustrated by the fact that the applicant was still in Greece and had not been deported in spite of the situation he had brought upon himself by trying to leave the country in August 2009. 274. In the alternative, the Government alleged that the applicant’s complaints were unfounded. They maintained that Greek legislation was in