In Brief
Washington visit
Droutsas meets with Clinton for talks on FYROM, Cyprus Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas was greeted by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington yesterday for talks that focused on Greek-Turkish relations, Greece’s ongoing efforts to resolve a dispute with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia over the latter’s name and the Cyprus problem. According to sources, Clinton welcomed the recent rapprochement between Athens and Ankara and urged for a swift settlement on name talks with Skopje. Kidnapping trial Entrepreneur to testify today Thessaloniki industrialist Giorgos Mylonas is today due to testify at at the trial of 11 people implicated in his kidnapping in June 2008. The defendants charged with the abduction of the 50-year-old entrepreneur include Vassilis Palaiocostas, the serial robber who has been on the run since he escaped from Korydallos Prison in February. Mylonas was held for 15 days by his kidnappers, who freed him after receiving an 11-million-euro ransom from his family. Bomb hoax Police sealed off roads around Stadiou and Aeolou streets in central Athens shortly before 1 p.m. yesterday after an anonymous caller telephoned the Eleftherotypia daily warning that a bomb had been planted at the busy junction. A search by bomb disposal experts failed to turn up any explosive devices. Psych probe Epaminondas Korkoneas, the policeman charged with shooting teenager Alexis Grigoropoulos in December 2008, was transferred to the psychiatric hospital of Attica’s Korydallos Prison yesterday after reportedly displaying aggressive behavior at the prison in Malandrino, in central Greece, where he was being detained as his trial gets under way in nearby Amfissa. Korkoneas will be examined by doctors to determine whether he is suffering from a psychiatric disorder. If it is deemed that he is, the trial is likely to be delayed a third time. Terror suspect A 21-year-old man, the seventh to be charged with participation in the terrorist organization Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire, is today to defend himself before an investigating magistrate. According to police, the suspect’s fingerprints were found on objects in an apartment in Halandri, northern Athens, believed to have been the group’s hideout. Fatal beating Four farmers from the village of Neohori in Thesprotia, in northern Greece, were being questioned by police yesterday after allegedly beating a policeman to death outside a stable. According to police, the officer died late on Monday after being beaten with planks of wood by the two men and two women. The motive of the attack was unclear.
