Macedonian Press Agency: News in English, 2000-03-16
MACEDONIAN PRESS AGENCY NEWS IN ENGLISH
Thessaloniki, March 16, 2000
SECTIONS
[A] NATIONAL NEWS
[B] INTERNATIONAL NEWS
NEWS HEADLINES
[A] NATIONAL NEWS
[01] XANTHI: PAPANDREOU VISITED THE MUSLIM MINORITY VILLAGES
[02] THE STOCK MARKET DOES NOT AFFECT THE ELECTION RESULTS
[03] THE YOUNG GREEKS HAVE BAD DIETARY HABITS
[04] GAINS OF 4.53% IN THE ATHENS STOCK EXCHANGE
[05] SIMITIS' PRESS CONFERENCE ON REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE
STOCK MARKET
[B] INTERNATIONAL NEWS
[06] NO PROBLEM FOR THE GREEKS IN KFOR
[07] ILIR META ASKED FOR THE HELP OF THE EUROPEAN INVESTMENT BANK
VICE-PRESIDENT
[08] PROTOCOL ON THE TRANSFER OF SENTENCED PERSONS
NEWS IN DETAIL
[A] NATIONAL NEWS
[01] XANTHI: PAPANDREOU VISITED THE MUSLIM MINORITY VILLAGES
Foreign minister Giorgos Papandreou toured Thrace in north-
eastern Greece and met with representatives of the Muslim
minority.
Mr. Papandreou speaking before the people living in the
minority villages in the mountainous region of Xanthi urged them
to look at the future with optimism as the efforts made in the
past years have brought them out of isolation and oblivion.
Referring to Greece's foreign policy, Mr. Papandreou
characterized it as an aggressive policy of peace, cooperation and
security for the wider Balkan region.
He said that new roads are being opened for the region where
the minorities will no longer be the victims of conflicts but a
creative presence for every culture and country.
[02] THE STOCK MARKET DOES NOT AFFECT THE ELECTION RESULTS
Impressive facts are included in the research conducted by
the ALCO polling company on behalf of the Athens radio station
"Alpha News" based on which, 72% of the people do not link the
course of the stock market with which party they will vote in the
April 9 elections. These facts are especially interesting because
they were gathered during a time when the Athens Stock Exchange
faced one of its worse crises in its history.
Based on the results of the opinion poll that is being
conducted on a daily basis, only 12% of those questioned believe
that the stock market will affect the election results, 8%
responded possibly "no" and 6% possibly "yes".
Twenty four days before the elections, the undecided voters
are 12%, while first in popularity is Coalition of the Left party
leader Nikos Konstantopoulos with 51.8%, followed by prime
minister and governing socialist party of PASOK leader Kostas
Simitis with 48.5%, right-wing main opposition party of New
Democracy leader Kostas Karamanlis with 40.1%, Democratic and
Social Movement Dimitris Tsovolas with 40.8% and Communist Party
general secretary Aleka Papariga with 22.9%.
[03] THE YOUNG GREEKS HAVE BAD DIETARY HABITS
Alarming facts on the dietary habits of the young Greeks were
presented in a press conference yesterday by the Consumers
Institute in Athens that was given in the presence of minister of
development Evangelos Venizelos on the occasion of the World
Consumer Day.
According to official data, 77% of the young Greeks prefer to
eat fast-food, snacks and packaged food, 42% eat regularly in fast-
food restaurants and all of their allowance is spent there, while
1 in 2 children are not informed on the need for more healthy
consumer habits not even by their own parents.
[04] GAINS OF 4.53% IN THE ATHENS STOCK EXCHANGE
For a second day the main index in the Athens Stock Exchange
recorded gains after a number of sessions with a downward course
that caused panic among small investors.
The main index closed today with gains of 4.53% at 4.759,89
points, while the volume of transactions remained limited at 188.1
billion drachmas even though it was characterized as satisfactory
because almost the whole of it concerned purchases and not sales.
[05] SIMITIS' PRESS CONFERENCE ON REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE
STOCK MARKET
Prime minister and governing socialist party of PASOK leader
Kostas Simitis launched a strong attack on those who are happy to
see the stock market plummeting responding to a question on
yesterday's recovery of the Athens Stock Exchange. Mr. Simitis
said that it is an autonomous institution that can not be included
in any pre-election strategy.
The statements were made in a press conference the prime
minister gave in the central Greek city of Volos in which he
presented PASOK's program on the balanced development of urban and
rural areas. He underlined that PASOK pays special attention to
the regional development.
Mr. Simitis stressed that the city of Volos is the
appropriate place to display PASOK's policy in this area given the
fact that the city experienced significant industrial development,
proving that there is a new momentum in dealing with regional
problems.
The prime minister also announced that 80% of the resources
from the 3rd community framework of support will be allocate to
regional development.
Responding to a question on the Greek-Turkish relations, Mr.
Simitis said that the Helsinki agreement was a big success for the
Greek foreign policy and those who complain that certain steps
have not been made are the same ones who did not want the specific
policy to be followed in the first place.
[B] INTERNATIONAL NEWS
[06] NO PROBLEM FOR THE GREEKS IN KFOR
No Greek soldier was brought back to Greece suffering from
respiratory problems, according to a statement made to BBC radio
by a Greek army officer from the army company deployed at the
border crossing of Blace at the borders of Kosovo with FYROM. The
Greek officer admitted however, that certain Greek soldiers wear
special masks to protect themselves form the calcium dust coming
out of the chimney of a plant operating in the region and lacks
protective filter.
According to recent press publications, Belgian and Greek
soldiers from the multi-national KFOR force who serve in the
region developed respiratory problems and spots of their skin that
are the result of the atmospheric pollution by calcium fibers
which are emitted from the specific industry plant. Based on the
same press publications, such symptoms appeared on two Greek
soldiers and one of them was taken to Greece to receive medical
assistance.
[07] ILIR META ASKED FOR THE HELP OF THE EUROPEAN INVESTMENT BANK
VICE-PRESIDENT
Albanian prime minister Ilir Meta asked for the assistance of
European Investment Bank vice-president Panagiotis Gennimatas in
order to overcome the problems that arose during the filing of
programs on behalf of Albania and increase the absorption ability
of the country based on those programs.
According to the newspaper "Gazeta Skiptare", Ilir Meta had a
telephone communication with the vice-president of the European
Investment Bank asking for his advise on the programs the Albanian
side will present in the Stability Pact conference in Brussels in
order to have fair and equal treatment.
[08] PROTOCOL ON THE TRANSFER OF SENTENCED PERSONS
Greece's permanent representative in the Council of Europe
ambassador Athanasios Theodorakopoulos signed the complementary
protocol in the treaty for the transfer of sentenced persons in
the presence of the European organization's general secretary
Walter Schwimmer.
The text includes the rules that have to be implemented when
the sentenced people are extradited from the country where they
were sentenced to their own country and in cases when people are
subject to extradition as a consequence of their sentencing.
The protocol supplements the 1983 Treaty for the transfer of
sentenced people and its main goal is the wider social
rehabilitation of the sentenced foreign nationals allowing for
their sentence to be carried out in their own countries.
The Treaty to a great extend is founded on humanitarian
principles based on the belief that the difficulties in
communication, the language barrier and the lack of contact with
family members can have negative effects on foreign inmates.
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