Athens News Agency: News in English, 00-02-10

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

CONTENTS

[01] Canada - Trade

[02] Simitis-Bucharest-summit

[03] OTE-New telephone

[04] Unifon - Internet

[05] Foreign Exchange Market-Close

[06] Secondary Bond Market-Close

[07] Greece-Turkey

[08] Economic policy - poll

[09] Stock market-close

[10] Elections - PASOK

[11] Labour - strike - culture - tourism

[01] Canada - Trade

Members of a Quebecquois trade delegation have found considerable ground for the development of trade relations between the Canadian province and northern Greece.

"Thessaloniki and the broader area has evolved into a particularly interesting market and is highly suitable to the development of business in the Balkans because of its geographical position," said Guy Julien, Quebec's Industry and External Trade Minister and head of the numerous delegation at a reception held in the city's Chamber of Commerce and Industry. Chamber President Dimitris Bakatselos stressed Greece was an ideal partner for business in the broader region.

[02] Simitis-Bucharest-summit

Prime Minister Costas Simitis departs on Friday for Bucharest to participate in a southeast European countries summit.

The summit, to which the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia has not been invited, is expected to adopt a "Good Neighbourliness Charter" which had been initialled two months ago by the participating countries' foreign ministers.

The charter is a political declaration of principles for this century. During the summit ways of enforcing regional economic cooperation are also expected to be discussed.

[03] OTE-New telephone

The Hellenic Telecommunications Organisation (OTE) is providing a new telephone with a double function, having the security of the regular network and the flexibility of the mobile phone.

OTE's managing director Symeonidis said the user of the telephone can use it either as a regular or mobile phone according to the distance of the apparatus from his home or office. Its cost is 100,000 drachmas, but it will cost 25,000 drachmas for the user choosing to have a new linkage with COSMOTE.

[04] Unifon - Internet

Unifon telecommunications company and Hellas On Line (HOL) have signed an agreement for cooperation in the provision of Internet services, according to an announcement on Thursday.

Unifon already holds a stake in HOL, and controls the e-motion digital technology chain of 60 shops to which 10 more are expected to be added within 2000.

[05] Foreign Exchange Market-Close

The drachma crept down against the euro and the US dollar in the domestic foreign exchange market on Thursday.

At the central bank's daily fixing, the euro was set at 332.880 drachmas from 332.850 drachmas in the previous session and 332.800 drachmas on Tuesday.

Also at the fixing, the dollar was set at 336.180 drachmas from 335.950 drachmas a day earlier and 337.300 drachmas on Tuesday.

[06] Secondary Bond Market-Close

Bonds in the domestic secondary market came under pressure on Thursday, tracking German bunds, after markets abroad were hit by talk that Austria was likely to be expelled from the European Union.

Domestic profit taking spread to paper like the 15-year bond that carried an attractive spread over bunds, and was expected to draw buyers.

[07] Greece-Turkey

The government on Thursday rejected claims in Turkish media that Greek fighter aircraft had harassed Turkish jets over the Aegean, saying the opposite was true.

"On the contrary, Turkish fighter aircraft violated Athens FIR yesterday (Wednesday) morning and Greek national air space between Limnos and Lesvos and east of Rhodes," government spokesman Dimitris Reppas said.

Reppas was responding to reports in Turkish papers Wednesday that Greek warplanes had harassed Turkish fighter planes on training missions over the past two weeks. The reports claimed the incidents occurred in international airspace near the northeastern Aegean island of Limnos but were not made public so as not to endanger the growing detente between Greece and Turkey.

[08] Economic policy - poll

Almost half of the residents of the prefecture of Attica support the government's economic policies, according to a poll published in the latest edition of financial weekly Ekonomikos Tachydromos.

The poll, conducted by V-PRC every two months, indicated that 44.5 percent of Attica residents supported the ruling socialists' economic and monetary union-oriented economic policy, while another 50.5 percent believed that the government was making no inroads in economic policy.

This latter figure was a marked fall from the 85 percent who said they had no confidence in economic policy a year ago.

The government found most support for its economic policies among middle and high income earners (72.5%) while more employers and self-employed professionals (58.2%) professed their support than they had in November (51%), when the barometer was last taken.

[09] Stock market-close

Equity prices ended Thursday's session sharply lower ending a seven-day rally which pushed the market 12.11 percent higher on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Traders said investors took early profits despite a wave of buying by foreign institutional investors in blue chip stocks like Hellenic Telecoms and National Bank of Greece.

The general index ended at 5,499.97 points, off 1.69 percent, near the day's lows. Turnover was a moderate 313.20 billion drachmas.

The FTSE/ASE 20 index for blue chip and heavy traded stocks fell 1.82 percent to 2,918.99 points, while the FTSE/ASE MID 40 index dropped 2.05 percent to 945.21 points.

The parallel market index for smaller capitalisation stocks fell 1.70 percent to 1,634.52 points.

[10] Elections - PASOK

A former conservative New Democracy expelled from his party for not toeing the line under new leader Costas Karamanlis said on Thursday he would be a candidate with the ruling socialists in the April 9 elections.

Vassilis Kontoyiannopoulos made the announcement to reporters after a meeting with Prime Minister Costas Simitis, the president of ruling PASOK.

Kontoyiannopoulos will run on PASOK's ticket for the Athens B' constituency.

Prime Minister Costas Simitis "is the prime minister which the country needs for the next four years," the former education minister told reporters.

[11] Labour - strike - culture - tourism

Culture ministry employees on Thursday said they had reached an agreement with the ministry on a range of issues and were calling off a strike scheduled for Friday.

The employees' union, POSYPPO, had called a 24-hour nationwide strike for Friday which would have closed down most museums and archaeological sites around the country.

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