Athens News Agency: News in English (PM), 99-09-28

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From: The Athens News Agency at <http://www.ana.gr>

NEWS IN ENGLISH

Athens, Greece, 28/09/1999 (ANA)

MAIN HEADLINES

• Greece pessimistic about Cyprus progress
• Ruling party official upbeat about prospects
• Homeless to be vaccinated against flu
• Aftershock measures 3.9 Richter
• Quake-stricken more likely to crash?
• Police arrest 14 young Romanian women
• Army patrol finds drug haul
• ANA signs contract with municipalities
• Weather
• Foreign Exchange

NEWS IN DETAIL

Recent statements by Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit on the prospects of resolving the Cyprus issue have poured cold water on hopes in Athens that a breakthrough in the longstanding dispute was in the offing. Government spokesman Dimitris Reppas said on Tuesday that the government was "pessimistic" about progress on the issue in the near future after Athens dailies carried reports of Ecevit saying progress on the Cyprus issue was a "chimera" if Greece and Turkey did not first sit down to discuss problems in the Aegean. "It doesn't allow for much optimism," Reppas said. "It indicates Turkey is sticking to its old positions".

Ruling party official upbeat about prospects

The political tide was turning in favour of the ruling PASOK party, which needed to "come out of its shell" in order to "capitalise on this positive climate", PASOK central committee chairman Costas Skandalidis said after a meeting with premier Costas Simitis today. He said this "change in the political climate" in favour of PASOK was "visible to the naked eye", but warned that "we still have a long road ahead of us". Questioned on the prospect of early general elections being called, Skandalidis described such talk as "a joke". The meeting, which lasted more than an hour, focussed on planning the party's course from here on and a review of recent events such as the September 7 deadly earthquake and the plunge on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Homeless to be vaccinated against flu

The health ministry on Tuesday said it would begin a programme of vaccinations for those vulnerable groups among the estimated 100,000 families left homeless by the September 7 quake. Health Minister Lambros Papadimas told reporters that the programme, beginning on Wednesday, would provide infants, the elderly and those with chronic problems with immunisation against the flu. Children whose immunisation records have been lost or destroyed will also receive a full round of vaccinations; Papadimas said 12,000 doses of vaccinations had been donated for this purpose by pharmaceutical companies.

Aftershock measures 3.9 Richter

Seismologists said on Tuesday that a strong aftershock shook the capital shortly before 9 a.m. They said the quake, which had the same epicentre as September 7 quake which killed more than 140 people, registered 3.9 on the Richter scale. They said the tremor was an aftershock and part of the normal course of developments in the wake of the quake.

Quake-stricken more likely to crash?

The health ministry said on Wednesday it was unaware of the details of an announcement from the Ambulance Service alleging that a sharp increase in traffic accidents was indirectly related to the September 7 quake. The Accident Prevention Department has issued a statement saying that an increase in the number of road accidents noted recently could be traced to the unregulated use of mood-altering drugs being used by those traumatised by the earthquake.

Police arrest 14 young Romanian women

Police arrested a Romanian man and 14 young Romanian women hidden in his refrigerator truck early on Monday. They said Konstantine Styre, 36, of Bucharest, had hidden the 14 young women among his load of wooden planks. The women told police they had travelled from Romania to Sofia, Bulgaria, in a Greek truck and been picked up by Styre in Sofia to make the crossing into Greece. The truck was stopped by financial crimes squad police on the Kilkis-Promahonas road, near Drosato. Their suspicions were alerted by the fact that the vehicle's cooling mechanism was not working. A search discovered the women.

Army patrol finds drug haul

An army patrol on Tuesday found 99 kilos of Indian cannabis and arrested one man thought to be part of a ring of Albanian-based drug traffickers. Arrested was Genjan Gloza, from Korce. The patrol said it had failed to arrest his two accomplices, who fled on being detected near the village of Korfoula in the border region of Kastoria. According to the latest figures, more than four tonnes of hashish have been confiscared in the Kastoria area over the past two years.

ANA signs contract with municipalities

The Central Union of Municipalities and Communities of Greece (KEDKE) has signed an agreement with the Athens News Agency (ANA) for the dispatch of ANA's new Municipal Advance Information Service to all the union's members. The accord, signed by KEDKE president Paris Koukoulopoulos and ANA general director Andreas Christodoulides, covers an initial three-month trial period. The Municipal Advance Information Service, the product of a collaboration between ANA and the Brussels-based private firm ELYROS, contains information that has not been published concerning the discussions in the various European Union committees, the decisions of the various Community agencies, and the Community programmes conceerning the periphery and local government.

WEATHER

FOREIGN EXCHANGE

Tuesday's rates (buying)
U.S. dollar          311.379
Pound sterling       513.320
Japanese yen (100)   296.410
French franc          49.603
German mark          166.362
Italian lira (100)    16.804
Irish Punt           413.142
Belgian franc          8.066
Finnish mark          54.725
Dutch guilder        147.649
Danish kr.            43.787
Austrian sch.         23.646
Spanish peseta         1.955
Swedish kr.           37.765
Norwegian kr.         39.660
Swiss franc          203.162
Port. Escudo           1.623
Can. dollar          211.911
Aus. dollar          203.727
Cyprus pound         563.357
Euro                 325.376

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