NEWS

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Group Popular Will claims 2004 blast, two failed hits A previously unknown terrorist group has claimed responsibility for a 2004 blast at a courthouse in Larissa, central Greece, and two failed bombings in Attica, the newspaper Eleftherotypia reported yesterday after receiving a written statement. The group, which calls itself Popular Will, claimed to be behind the Larissa bombing and two thwarted attacks – one outside a policy research institute in the district of Neos Cosmos earlier this week and another at the end of June outside an office block in Maroussi. Police said all three bombs had been set to be triggered by a mobile phone. GEORGIAN REMANDED Actor’s killer seeks forgiveness A 30-year-old Georgian man, charged with murdering popular actor Nikos Sergianopoulos, was remanded in custody yesterday after testifying for four hours before an investigating magistrate. The Georgian, who has allegedly admitted to stabbing the 56-year-old at the actor’s Pangrati home on the night of June 3, yesterday expressed his regret. «I ask forgiveness from the relatives, I am in great pain,» he told reporters. The man claims to have disarmed and stabbed the actor after the latter made aggressive sexual advances while brandishing a knife. Turkey encouraged Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis yesterday welcomed a decision by an Ankara court not to outlaw Turkey’s ruling party, which had been charge with undermining secularism, but to fine it instead. «The decision of the Turkish Constitutional Court puts an end to uncertainty and instability in the political life of Turkey,» Bakoyannis said. She urged the Justice and Development Party of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan «to adopt and implement the reforms necessary for pursing the process of Turkish membership in the European Union.» Helios charges An Athens prosecutor yesterday brought charges against six officials of the now defunct Cypriot carrier Helios Airways over an airplane crash at Grammatiko, northeastern Attica, in August 2005 that caused the deaths of 121 people. Most of the officials face charges of negligent manslaughter. The prosecutor lodged the charges after examining the results of a probe into the crash that has just been completed by an investigating magistrate. Thessaloniki trash The union of street cleaners in Thessaloniki yesterday called for the city’s saturated Tagarades landfill to be re-opened by the end of the year, by which time efforts will have been made to find an alternative solution for the city’s waste management problem. According to the workers, the Tagarades dump could be used until problems with a new landfill, in the district of Mavrorachi, have been ironed out. The operation of the Mavrorachi site has been blocked by local residents. Pimp caught A 52-year-old man has been arrested in Thessaloniki on suspicion of procuring six foreign women aged 20 to 37. Police said the man was caught after agreeing to provide one of the women for sex with an undercover officer. The unnamed suspect allegedly kept the women in three apartments.

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