In Brief
TRAFFIC CAMERAS
Top prosecutor says electronic devices can be used to record driving offenses Traffic police are fully entitled to use photographic or video cameras, as well as radar traps to record violations of the highway code by motorists, Supreme Court prosecutor Dimitris Linos informed police yesterday. Linos found that the use of such devices, even when human personnel are not on the spot to operate them, does not contravene the constitution. Several drivers caught by photographic cameras policing Athens bus lanes, or by radar speed traps on national roads, had challenged the police’s use of the devices as unconstitutional. Linos’s ruling did not include cameras installed in Athens and other Olympic towns ahead of the Games. MYSTERIOUS BANGS Turkish jets violated air space, but did not cause noise, military says Two formations of Turkish fighter jets yesterday violated Greek national air space near the island of Rhodes twice, military officials said. The four Turkish jets were chased off by as many Greek aircraft and there were two simulated dogfights, the officials said. The Joint Chiefs of Staff issued a statement refuting reports that loud bangs heard on Rhodes were the result of the Turkish jets breaking the sound barrier. ATHENS TRAFFIC DISRUPTIONS Academias, Vouliagmenis affected Traffic on central Academias Street will be subject to disruptions between Ippocratous and Vas. Sofias streets until early next Saturday after road-resurfacing works got under way yesterday. The works will be carried out between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. daily. Traffic on Vouliagmenis Avenue will also be disrupted following the launch of works between Aghios Dimitrios and Glyfada. The works, to be carried out from 10.30 p.m. to 6.30 a.m. daily, are to continue until June 10. DIKKI lives on The Democratic Social Movement (DIKKI) will be able to take part in European Parliament elections next month following yesterday’s court ruling upholding an injunction filed by DIKKI cadres against a decision by Dimitris Tsovolas to dissolve the party which he founded as a PASOK splinter group. Tsovolas suspended DIKKI’s operation in March after it failed to get into Parliament for the second consecutive time. Commissioner stopped Turkish-Cypriot officials on Thursday prevented Cyprus’s European Union Commissioner, Markos Kyprianou, from entering the Turkish-occupied north of the island, reports from Nicosia said yesterday. The officials demanded that Kyprianos show his passport, something which is not required of any other EU commissioner. Composer dies Award-winning composer and conductor Takis Athinaios died yesterday at the age of 84. Athinaios was honorary chairman of the Panhellenic Music Association and directed the Greek Light Radio Orchestra for 20 years. Urban railway The temporary station of Iraklion on the Piraeus-Kifissia urban electric railway (ISAP) will not be operating tomorrow. ELA trial A witness to the attempted murder of trade union chief Giorgos Raftopoulos by the Revolutionary Popular Struggle (ELA) in 1987 yesterday told an Athens court trying five suspected ELA terrorists he was sure that the car from which the shooting was carried out was that of defendant Michalis Kassimis. Kaisariani fire A fire in the Kaisariani firing range park yesterday ravaged 5,000 square meters of trees. Police believe the blaze was started by a flare thrown by a minor. Pedestrians protest An Athens group called the «Citizens’ Initiative for Pedestrian Rights» is due at midday today to block the pedestrian streets of Apostolou Pavlou and Irakleidon in the Thiseion to protest at the cars and cafe tables which are increasingly crowding the capital’s walkways. Olympic soccer Soccer was yesterday confirmed as an Olympic sport after FIFA chief Joseph Blatter signed the World Anti-Doping Agency code.
