A total of 62 archaeological sites and monuments will be open free of charge tonight in an annual event organized by the Culture Ministry on the occasion of the August full moon. The sites, which will be open from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m, include major crowd-pullers such as the Acropolis and the Roman Agora in Athens, Delos, Olympia, Dion, ancient Corinth and Sounion. Free concerts will be staged at most of the sites.

Full moon serenades this evening

In addition to the 100,000 euros pledged on Friday, Greece will send a consignment of humanitarian aid including tents, blankets, food and medicine to the victims of last week’s floods in Sudan, Deputy Foreign Minister Andreas Loverdos said yesterday. The United Nations joined with non-governmental organizations yesterday in launching an appeal to international donors for 8.63 million dollars in emergency aid following the worst floods in 70 years in the east of the country.

Coast guard officers on the island of Lesvos yesterday arrested nine illegal immigrants from Somalia and Sudan in the port of Mytilene. The seven men and two women said they had been ferried across from the coast of Turkey by Turkish people-smugglers. Earlier yesterday, four Afghan men were arrested in an inflatable dinghy off the coast of Lesvos. They had rowed over from Turkey.

As Turkish-Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash claimed that a total of 18 Greek Cypriots have tabled lawsuits with officials in the Turkish-occupied part of Cyprus seeking the restitution of their properties in the north, government officials in Nicosia yesterday said they had no information to support such a claim. The Cypriot government has strongly condemned such legal action, which it says would seriously compromise Cyprus’s national interests. Meanwhile, commenting on a proposal by Denktash for a customs treaty between the occupied north and Nicosia, government spokesman Kypros Chrysostomides said: “Mr Denktash is living in a world of his own.” Denktash signed a similar agreement with Turkey on Friday.

A Serres man was charged yesterday with the bloody murder, on Sunday, of his baby son. Psychiatrists are to examine Constantinos Antikoglou, 21, to ascertain whether he was sane at the time of the murder, and whether he had been under the influence of drugs. Serres residents tried to lynch Antikoglou when he arrived at the local courts complex yesterday. The 2-month-old boy was stabbed to death with a carving knife in the family flat, in an attack so violent that his heart was torn out. Police say Antikoglou has confessed, claiming to have been under intense stress after losing his job in a Serres confectioner’s shop.

Four forest fires broke out yesterday in the areas of Kotronas in Mani, Paramythia in western Greece, Elatia in Fthiotis and Yialtra on Evia. Firemen, assisted by firefighting planes and helicopters, had managed to bring all four blazes under control by late yesterday.

A section of Doukissis Plakentias Street in northeastern Athens (between Metamorphoseos and Olympou streets) that was closed to traffic for eight months after a section of the tarmac collapsed inward due to metro tunneling work in January will open to motorists again today.

Thousands of hectares of crops, mainly cotton and maize, in Thessaly — mainly in the vicinity of Larissa, Tyrnavos and Trikala — were destroyed by hail storms on Sunday afternoon, local authorities said yesterday.

Police in Crete are seeking a 38-year-old man from the village of Geraki, near Kastelli, who is suspected of having tried to murder a fellow-villager yesterday following a dispute over land ownership. Ioannis Makrakis allegedly shot Nikolaos Giaourakis, 34, twice, severely injuring him in the arm. Giaourakis was hospitalized in stable condition.