In Brief
FATAL SHOOTING
Man, 24, gunned down by four attackers in Athens street A 24-year-old man was shot dead in Neos Cosmos, near central Athens, on Wednesday night after an argument in the street with four men, police said yesterday. The victim, who was shot twice, was named as Vacel Kanani, an Albanian national. Police said that it was not immediately clear what caused the incident, which occurred at 9.30 p.m. They are still searching for the four suspects. RIO-ANTIRIO BRIDGE Toll for cars to increase by 40 cents from January 8 The toll on the Rio-Antirio bridge linking western Greece to the Peloponnese will go up by 40 cents for car drivers from January 8, the operating company Gefyra SA said yesterday. The new cost for a crossing will be 10.90 euros. Charges for motorcycles will remain unchanged at 1.70 euros. Gefyra said that the new charges will remain in place for all of 2007. Every day some 12,000 vehicles cross the bridge, which was completed just before the Athens Olympics in 2004. ALLERGY WARNING Products with poor labeling found The Hellenic Food Authority (EFET) said yesterday that it had discovered in two products improperly labeled ingredients that can cause allergic reactions. The watchdog said that it found gluten in the Delfini fish croquettes sold by the AB Vassilopoulos supermarket chain. Inspectors also discovered traces of nuts in the Spar hazelnut and cocoa cream sold by Veropoulos supermarkets. EFET said that it has asked the companies to withdraw the products and label them properly. Death on tracks A 25-year-old man was killed in Orestiada, northeastern Greece, yesterday after trying to climb aboard a moving train, authorities said. The unnamed man allegedly tried to board the train as it was passing slowly through the old railway station in Orestiada but slipped and fell. The man, a foreign national, was pronounced dead on arrival at a nearby hospital. Pensioner released A magistrate yesterday released from custody a 90-year-old farmer from Crete who shot and injured a suspected thief in his home on Tuesday. The unnamed pensioner told authorities that he shot the intruder without realizing it was the 25-year-old Moldovan man who had been helping him with his farming tasks. The magistrate said there was no need to hold the elderly man but told him not to leave the village of Kalamitsi. The young Moldovan, who suffered serious stomach injuries, is still in the hospital. Lottery scam Police arrested yesterday a 34-year-old man in Piraeus in connection with an alleged lottery scam. The suspect, an unnamed Nigerian national, allegedly contacted people at random to inform them that they had won a UK-based lottery. A Saudi Arabian man who responded to the message was asked to deposit $3,705 in a Greek bank account to claim his winnings. The suspect then asked for another $5,800 to complete the transaction. The victim suspected a scam and flew to Athens to meet a supposed representative of the lottery firm. He tipped off police, who arrested the Nigerian at the hotel where the two men were due to meet. Victim fights back Four suspects accused of holding up a 66-year-old man at gunpoint in his home on Halkida, central Greece, were expected to be charged late yesterday. Police said that the four men broke into the older man’s home in the Magoula area and started to beat him in his bed while demanding that he hand over his money. However, the victim resisted and a gun backfired, injuring one of the assailants. All four were later arrested when they took the injured suspect to a local hospital for treatment. Cannabis dumped A police border patrol yesterday found a bag containing 15 kilos of cannabis that had been dumped in a forest area in Florina, northern Greece. Police said they have launched an investigation to find the person who had abandoned the cannabis in the area, which is close to the Greek-Albanian border. Cretan crimes Seventeen murders and 13 attempted homicides took place on Crete in 2006, 28 of which were solved, Vassilis Lourakis, the chief of police in Crete, said yesterday.
