In Brief
WINTER HOURS
Clocks go back one hour at 4 a.m. tomorrow as summer time ends Clocks go back one hour tomorrow (Sunday) at 4 a.m. – to 3 a.m. – as European Summer Time ends and Greece officially enters winter time. Clocks change back to summer time at the end of March. MIGRANT-SMUGGLING Cretan court convicts eight An Iraklion court yesterday passed down 10-year jail sentences on eight people found guilty of smuggling 75 illegal immigrants to Crete last Sunday. A ninth suspected smuggler was cleared. On Thursday, coast guards on Lesvos detained a group of 18 would-be migrants who had reached the island from Turkey in three inflatable rowboats. Also on Thursday, officials on Chios detained four would-be migrants who had reached the island in a wooden rowboat, also from Turkey. Sick flock The Agricultural Development and Food Ministry yesterday ordered the slaughter of a flock of goats in Halkidiki found to be infected with a human strain of tuberculosis. Checks on sheep and goats in the area revealed that other herds have been infected with other strains of tuberculosis which cannot be transmitted to humans, the ministry said. Support for Arafat Political leaders yesterday wished ailing Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat a speedy recovery. «We hope that (Arafat) will overcome whatever health problems are affecting him and reassume his duties very soon,» PASOK leader George Papandreou said in a statement. Synaspismos Left Coalition leader Nikos Constantopoulos and Communist Party (KKE) leader Aleka Papariga also sent their best wishes to Arafat. AWACS arrives The first of four Airborne Warning and Control Systems (AWACS) planes yesterday landed at the military airport at Elefsina, the air force said. The air force is due to take delivery of the remaining three AWACS by the middle of 2006. Truck ban Trucks leaving Athens carrying dangerous substances, such as fuel in liquid or gas form, will be banned from using tunnels on the Athens-Corinth National Road from Monday until the end of November for safety reasons, it was announced yesterday. Hash haul Border guards yesterday arrested two Albanians after seizing 140 kilos of cannabis they had tried to smuggle into the country. The officers had set up an ambush in the region of Kotsika following a tip-off. The two men, and another four countrymen, had been carrying sacks containing the drugs when police surprised them. The other four dropped their bags and fled. PPC complaint Development Minister Dimitris Sioufas yesterday sent a letter to the director of the Public Power Corporation (PPC), Stergios Nezis, asking him to send a top PPC official to Thessaloniki to determine why a local PPC branch office shut earlier than its official closing time on Wednesday morning. Sioufas took action following local press reports about the incident and citizens’ complaints. Chemical leak Fire brigade officers yesterday morning cordoned off the site of a transport firm in the Athenian district of Votanikos after an unidentified chemical substance leaked out of an unlabeled barrel on the company grounds and onto a nearby sidewalk. Chemical experts from the fire brigade were summoned to identify the substance but no conclusions had been announced by late yesterday. TEI shuts The Athens state technical college (TEI) is to close down from Tuesday due to financial problems, its board of directors decided yesterday.
