One man was killed and another seriously injured in the early hours yesterday when they fell off their motorcycle after accelerating quickly to avoid a routine police check on Katehaki Avenue in eastern Athens, police said. According to officers, the pair, who have not been named, were riding one of several motorcycles that failed to stop when asked to do so, but were not pursued.

There will be no gaps in the ferry links from the mainland to the Dodecanese and between the islands themselves during the busy Easter and summer periods, Aegean and Island Policy Minister Aristotelis Pavlidis claimed on Saturday. He said that an extra ferry would be serving the island of Astypalaia and that he was in talks with ferry companies interested in reopening the Thessaloniki-Samos-Dodecanese route.

State-owned airline Cyprus Airways is gradually to close down its loss-making Athens-based subsidiary Hellas Jet, Cypriot Communications Minister Haris Thrassou said on Saturday. Hellas Jet was losing an estimated 1.5 million euros a month. A British and Dutch company had made tentative bids to buy Hellas Jet but Cyprus Airways rejected the offers. Closure of the airline is expected to cost between 15 and 17 million euros in paying staff compensation and settling outstanding debts. (AFP)

The governments of the US and Cyprus have signed a bilateral agreement to cooperate in checking ships on the open seas as part of an effort to combat the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and international terrorism, the US Embassy in Nicosia said on Saturday.