In Brief
Landfill shut
Workers protest lax security after scavenger dies amid trash Athens’s only legal landfill has been shut down by workers who are protesting the lack of security at the site, as they revealed that a man who was scavenging among the trash was killed last week. The leader of the municipal workers at the Ano Liosia dump, Giorgos Hardas, told Skai TV yesterday that an immigrant from Pakistan died after being buried under a mound of rubbish. He said that the employees were no longer willing to put up with the risk of people wandering into the site, which, he argued, is not properly protected. «Sanitary workers cannot carry the weight of person’s death on their shoulders,» he said, adding that unless authorities step up security at the dump, the employees would refuse to go to work. FUGITIVE CAUGHT Drug trafficker back in jail The 31-year-old Mexican who escaped from Korydallos Prison on Monday was recaptured early yesterday. The fugitive, who had been serving a life sentence for drug trafficking, was found in the basement of an apartment in Korydallos, southern Athens, and arrested by local police officers. He escaped on Monday after hiding in a garbage truck that had entered the prison yard to collect trash. His disappearance was only discovered when prison guards conducted a head count. Kythera wildfire A wildfire on Kythera was extinguished yesterday but a larger blaze, burning since Saturday, had still not been brought under control. It is estimated that the larger wildfire has burned more than 1,000 hectares of land, which included olive groves and vineyards. Firefighters yesterday were also battling fires in Corinthia, west of Athens, and Thesprotia, on Greece’s border with Albania. Bloody row A drunken argument between two Romanian laborers in the Peloponnesian town of Kyparissia resulted yesterday in one of the pair being stabbed and seriously injured, police said. The two men, aged 56 and 58, shared an apartment and had apparently been drinking heavily before arguing with one another. The 56-year-old used a kitchen knife to stab his housemate in the stomach. The victim was taken to the hospital for treatment and the 56-year-old was arrested. Caught on camera A 39-year-old man has been arrested in Hersonissos, Crete, on suspicion of pretending to be a photographer so that he could steal potential customers’ money and valuables. The suspect, a foreign national, was arrested after an 18-year-old British woman complained to police that the man had stolen her wallet after approaching her to take her photo. Police said that when they arrested the 39-year-old, they found stolen watches, cameras, cell phones, a gold ring and a purse containing 400 euros in his possession. Windsurfer rescued A 31-year-old windsurfer who had gone missing off the coast of the Dodecanese island of Astypalaia on Monday was found safe and unharmed the same day, authorities revealed yesterday. The unnamed man was located after a search involving two coast guard boats, a navy ship and a number of private vessels.
