Athens News Agency: News in English, 00-09-21

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

CONTENTS

[01] Thessaloniki-"Florina Bulgaria"-Loan

[02] Robotic Surgery-Athens

[03] Cinema-Music

[04] Australia-Britain-Parthenon Marbles

[05] Banks-Strike

[06] Foreign Exchange Rates-Friday

[07] Weather Forecast-Friday

[08] Greece-Simitis-fuel prices

[09] ASE-close

[10] Mouzakis SA-new unit

[01] Thessaloniki-"Florina Bulgaria"-Loan

The Black Sea Trade and Development Bank (TEAEP), also known as the Black Sea Bank, has approved a loan amounting to 2.7 million dollars for the Florina Bulgaria SA company, founded in Sofia in 1993 by Greek and Bulgarian shareholders.

The amount will be used for an investment totalling 12.5 million dollars which the company will make in Bulgaria. The duration of the loan is six years and it has a 12-month period of grace.

[02] Robotic Surgery-Athens

The first ever robot assisted surgical procedure in Greece will take place at the Athens Medical Centre on Monday, by a team of sergeants, the centre announced on Thursday.

The team will be led by Ohio University Prof. Konstantinos Konstantinidis and will use the AESOP 3000 robotic system, which responds to verbal commands of the surgical team. This system has been used on more than 70,000 procedures around the world.

[03] Cinema-Music

Six new cinemas will screen Greek and foreign quality films, not included in the regular distribution system, throughout the winter, while their programme will include children's films on Sunday mornings and entertaining live concerts between evening and night shows.

The events will be carried out in the halls of the network "Filmcentre 2000" at the initiative of the Greek Cinema Centre and will provide an alternative in this sector.

The initiative will start at the Trianon cinema on September 25 with the film "America, America" by Elia Kazan and the Orchestra of Colours, which will give a live performance of the film's music which had been composed by Manos Hadzidakis.

[04] Australia-Britain-Parthenon Marbles

MELBOURNE (ANA S. Hatzimanolis) - Australian daily ?The Sydney Morning Herald? accused Great Britain of ?cultural imperialism? in its main article, on Thursday, calling for the return of the Parthenon Marbles to Greece.

The article successfully argued against statements of British Culture Minister Chris Smith in an interview to the same newspaper, stating that Greeces request for the return of the marbles has no legal ground.

Smith reiterated the arguments of the British government regarding the marbles and denied that the Labour government under Tony Blair was indifferent toward culture.

The newspaper article called argument of the minister legalistic and anachronistic as it reminds of 19th century practices, when the British Empire controlled the world.

[05] Banks-Strike

The bank workers' union upheld its call for a nationwide strike on Friday following the collapse of talks with the government.

Union leaders met Labour and Social Security Minister Tassos Yiannitsis on Thursday, who pledged that checks would be stepped up to ensure that banks were keeping to agreed opening hours.

The leaders rejected a proposal by Yiannitsis that negotiations for a shorter 35-hour working week should be linked to more flexible terms of employment.

[06] Foreign Exchange Rates-Friday

Indicative rates released by the central bank for the next working day.

Fridays rates (buying)

Euro 336.367

U.S. dollar 395.461

German mark 171.982

French franc 051.278

Pound sterling 560.698

Irish punt 427.099

Belgian franc 008.338

Luxembourg franc 008.338

Dutch guilder 152.637

Italian lira (100) 017.372

Austrian schilling 024.445

Danish kroner 045.063

Swedish kroner 040.126

Finnish mark 056.573

Spanish peseta 002.022

Portuguese escudo 001.677

Japanese yen (100) 372.258

Swiss franc 223.096

Norwegian kroner 042.100

Cyprus pound 588.256

Canadian dollar 266.431

Australian dollar 213.161

[07] Weather Forecast-Friday

Sunny weather is forecast in most parts of the country on Friday with northern and central mainland Greece likely to see showers or storms. Early morning mist is expected. Winds variable, light to moderate. Temperatures in the north and west will range from 17C to 29C; in the rest of mainland Greece from 19C to 35C; and in the Aegean islands from 21C to 33C. Mostly sunny in Athens, with temperatures between 21C and 35C. Showery in Thessaloniki, with temperatures ranging from 18C to 27C.

[08] Greece-Simitis-fuel prices

Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis on Thursday urged the public to remain calm to deal with a surge of world oil prices to their highest levels in the last 10 years.

Speaking to reporters after a meeting of a cabinet committee to discuss the oil price issue, Simitis said the government was examining plans to take special measures to protect lower incomes if oil prices remained at such high levels for long.

"These measures will be taken in the framework of a new budget," he said.

The Prime Minister noted that the government would use all available means to avoid an over-increase in consumer goods' prices and to protect consumers and underlined that the government would be particularly strict in combatting profiteering and unfair competition practices.

[09] ASE-close

Equity prices lost further substantial ground on Thursday pushing the general index near the 4,000 support-level on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Traders said a negative climate in international markets led to waves of selling by foreign funds in blue chip stocks, like Commercial Bank. Hellenic Telecoms was particularly hit reflecting pressures in stocks in the telecommunications sector in other European markets.

The general index ended 1.52 percent lower at 4,040.61 points, off the day's lows of 4,010.33 points. Turnover was a moderate 104.397 billion drachmas.

The FTSE/ASE 20 index for blue chip and heavy traded stocks ended 2.33 percent lower at 2,293.39 and the FTSE/ASE 40 index eased 0.50 percent to 532.23 points.

The parallel market index for smaller capitalisation stocks ended 1.28 percent lower at 622.75 points.

[10] Mouzakis SA-new unit

Mouzakis SA-Thessaly Ginning on Thursday inaugurated its new ginning house in the Karditsa prefect, central Greece.

Eleftherios Mouzakis, chairman of the board, said the new ginning house was a state of the art unit, using Continental IGLI's mechanical equipment and of a total investment of 4.2 billion drachmas.

The new ginning house will have a production capacity of 65 million KG annually and it will create 80 jobs.

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