In Brief
ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS
Two Turks arrested on suspicion of trafficking 35 migrants to Greece The coast guard yesterday detained 35 illegal immigrants who were traveling in a Turkish-flagged wooden boat off the Aegean island of Agathonisi, the Merchant Marine Ministry said. Two Turks, aged 22 and 23, were arrested on suspicion of human trafficking. The nationalities of the immigrants were not disclosed. Separately, another six migrants were detained off the island of Samos after sailing from the Turkish coast aboard an inflatable dinghy. FATHER MISSING Man who shot his young daughter by mistake eludes police on Crete Police on Crete had by last night failed to track down the unnamed father of a 3-year-old girl who was shot in the back by accident on Saturday. The child was still in stable condition at the university hospital of Iraklion yesterday after suffering serious injuries. Officers said that the girl was shot by mistake by her father at home in Hania when he fired the illegally owned gun. Police said that in Hania alone they have confiscated 130 illegally owned guns this year as well as 10,000 pieces of ammunition, including bullets and hand grenades. RAILWAY WORKS Residents protest at felled pines Residents of the western Athenian suburb of Aghioi Anargyroi were yesterday up in arms after discovering that some 100 pine trees, which used to stand alongside the tracks of the suburban railway line, had been felled. The trees were cut down to allow for the construction of a second set of tracks between the railway station at Aghioi Anargyroi and the area of Treis Gefyres – effectively an extension to the suburban railway route, residents said. An appeal by residents against the work, discussed in June by the Council of State, is pending. About 1,000 pines, of an estimated 2,500 that line Athens’s suburban railway route, have been sacrificed for the project. Forged links Two brothers, aged 40 and 48, have been arrested for a number of robberies around Greece as well as for forging banknotes, police said yesterday. One of the unnamed brothers has also been accused of abusing the 53-year-old Ukrainian woman with whom he lived. Police found 17 forged 50-euro bills in the possession of the two men, both Albanian nationals, when they arrested the pair in Athens. The brothers were also wanted for blackmail and illegal possession of firearms. Illegal arsenal Police arrested yesterday morning an employee of the Athens Water Company (EYDAP) in Piraeus yesterday after discovering that he illegally had eight guns and 500 bullets at his home, officers said yesterday. The 40-year-old’s armory included a submachine gun and four revolvers. Mediterranean pollution Millions of tons of pollutants are being dumped into the Mediterranean Sea every year by industries in countries that border the Mediterranean region, the Secretariat of the Mediterranean Action Plan (UNEP/MAP) said in Athens yesterday. MAP said that the major sources of pollution are metal industries, oil refineries, tanneries, chemical industries and food-processing factories. MAP is launching an exhibition at 7 p.m. today at the National Hellenic Research Foundation (48 Vassileos Constantinou Avenue) in central Athens to highlight its activities. Dead companion An 86-year-old woman had kept the body of her 83-year-old sister in her Volos home in northern Greece for two months after she died, authorities said yesterday. Acting on complaints from neighbors of a bad smell coming from the apartment, police entered the home to find the dead woman’s partly decomposed body seated at the kitchen table. The 86-year-old does not appear to have been aware of what she had done, according to police. Cafeteria explosion Two people were injured when a gas tank exploded at a cafeteria in Kozani, northern Greece, authorities said. The cause of the explosion, which occurred at about 10 a.m., is not known. Heroin arrests Two Albanian nationals were arrested in Thessaloniki yesterday accused of possessing 2.4 kilos of heroin, police said. The narcotics were found at the apartment shared by the two men, aged 31 and 29.
