The Development Ministry launched an advertising campaign yesterday informing residents of how they can slash their energy bills. The ministry will distribute more than 200,000 pamphlets over the next two weeks in Athens and Thessaloniki encouraging drivers to slow down and telling residents how they can save on heating bills.

The General Secretary for Consumers Thanassis Skordas sent a circular yesterday — the first day of the new school year — to all of the country’s prefectures, reminding them to conduct regular checks on school canteens. Skordas instructed them that the inspections should focus first on health and safety issues and then on the price of the goods being sold.

A fire that broke out in Seikh-Sou Forest on the outskirts of Thessaloniki at around 3.30 p.m. yesterday was put out within an hour, authorities said. Some 45 firemen and 20 fire engines were needed to extinguish the blaze. It was not immediately clear how much of the forest was scorched.

Firefighters managed to put out a blaze that had broken out yesterday morning at an electrical goods store in the center of Iraklion, Crete, and threatened to spread to nearby buildings. There was concern that the fire, which was probably caused by a short circuit at a Kotsovolos appliance store, could have caused major damage to a busy area of the city. The fire brigade said it was one of the greatest firefighting efforts ever seen in Iraklion.

Theater actress Leda Tassopoulou died yesterday at the age of 52 after a long battle with cancer. She was a founding member of the Amphitheatro theater group and was best known for playing leading roles in ancient Greek tragedies. Her last appearance was in 2004 when she played Andromache at the Ancient Theater of Epidaurus. She had appeared in numerous plays at Epidaurus over a 30-year period. She was married to director Spyros A. Evangelatos. Her funeral will be held tomorrow at the First Cemetery in Athens.

A 25-year-old Pakistani national was found dead in Aspropyrgos, west of Athens, yesterday after he received serious head injuries in what police said was probably a knife attack. The warehouse in which the man lived was in disarray, indicating that a fight had taken place, police said.

Cyprus’s Jewish community inaugurated the island’s first synagogue yesterday in the seaside city of Larnaca. “This is an historic event for Cyprus,” Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel Yona Metzge, told a 100-strong crowd at the ceremony. “Cyprus is a state where all religions are tolerated and we welcome the Jewish synagogue,” Cypriot Education Minister Pefkios Georgiades said. Until now, Cyprus was the only European Union member to lack a synagogue. (AP)

Coast guards on Chios picked up 19 illegal immigrants on a rocky outcrop off the eastern Aegean island early yesterday morning, the Merchant Marine Ministry said. They were taken to the island’s reception center for questioning.

Four armed men held up a parked truck containing televisions in Mandra, west of Athens, early yesterday and made away with the haul by towing the trailer with another vehicle, police said. The driver and co-driver told police they were handcuffed in the truck’s cab after being threatened at gunpoint shortly after 4.20 a.m. The driver was shot in the leg and was being treated in hospital for a light wound.