In Brief
ELA TRIAL
Defense to appeal to politicians over court’s rejection of objections Lawyers representing Revolutionary Popular Struggle (ELA) suspects in the ongoing trial yesterday said they would take their case to the heads of the country’s political parties after it refused to provide them with a document detailing the reasoning behind its decision to reject all objections filed by defendants. The first eight witnesses in the trial – including journalist Vassilis Zissis and the ex-wife of ELA suspect Angeletos Kanas, Sophia Kyriakidou – have been summoned to appear in court today. KOKKALIS Software tycoon charged with alleged money laundering An Athens prosecutor yesterday brought money laundering charges against software and telecoms equipment tycoon Socrates Kokkalis. Spyros Mouzakitis took the action following a request by appeals court prosecutor Antonis Mytis, who had conducted an investigation based on articles by Kathimerini on Kokkalis’s activities. The case was assigned to investigating magistrate Dimosthenis Vlachos. MOROCCAN AID Aircraft transport rescue workers A C-130 military transport aircraft carrying 22 rescue workers, two sniffer dogs and search-and-rescue equipment has been sent to Morocco to boost the search for survivors of Tuesday’s fatal earthquake, Deputy Foreign Minister Andreas Loverdos said. A second aircraft was also due to transport nine doctors and medical supplies. Church on Church Bishop Chrysostomos of Paphos yesterday appeared to temper the support he had expressed earlier this week for Archbishop Christodoulos’s vehement rejection of a United Nations plan for the reunification of Cyprus, asserting that the archbishop had perhaps not been adequately informed about the situation in Cyprus «due to (his) distance (from the island).» Chrysostomos backtracked after other Cypriot clerics opposed the archbishop’s claims that the UN plan would «de-Hellenize» Cyprus. Election contenders The Supreme Court yesterday approved the participation of 20 political parties in next month’s general elections, stipulating that Athanassios Daskalopoulos must run under his own name, instead of at the head of a party called New Dictatorship, as he had wanted. The court ruled out the participation of two fringe environmental parties which had also tabled applications to contend in the elections. Kavalari bridge An 18th century stone bridge near the village of Kavalari in the Zagorohoria area of Epirus, which collapsed earlier this month following heavy rainfall, is to be rebuilt, according to a decision by Public Works Minister Vasso Papandreou cited by the daily Ethnos yesterday. The rebuilding of the bridge is to be carried out using traditional materials and techniques and will be undertaken by the firm constructing the Egnatia Highway in northern Greece, the daily said. Hasty robber A 38-year-old man who attempted to rob a bank in Dafni, eastern Athens, yesterday afternoon lost the game when he set his gun down to pick up the 15,000 euros handed over to him by the bank clerk. Panayiotis Stamatopoulos was arrested after being chased out of the bank, and through a street market, by a customer who had grabbed his gun. Dead flamingoes Fourteen dead flamingoes found near Larnaca’s Salt Lake over the past week had been poisoned by swallowing lead pellets, reports from Cyprus said yesterday. More than 50 flamingoes died last year after eating pellets fired from a nearby shooting range. A clean up project has yet to be completed, environmentalists said yesterday, adding that the level of lead in the area is thousands of times higher than the safety limit. Karachi five Foreign Minister Tassos Yiannitsis said yesterday that he reiterated Greece’s appeal for the repatriation of five seamen under house arrest in Karachi during a summit with his European Union counterparts in Brussels on Monday and asked for the EU to apply more pressure on Pakistani authorities to release the crew of the Tasman Spirit. The Greek tanker caused a massive oil spill when it sank off Karachi last August.
