NEWS

In Brief

Transport disruptions

Walkout to hit services between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. A work stoppage by employees on public transport in the capital today will mean services on trolley buses and buses will be suspended between 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. while services on the metro, Piraeus-Kifissia urban electric railway (ISAP) and tram will be halted from noon to 4 p.m. There will also be disruption on the intercity railway and the Proastiakos suburban railway today as employees stage a five-hour work stoppage from noon. Pharmacists hit back Piraeus stores closed today Pharmacies in Piraeus will be closed today due to a strike by pharmacists protesting the government’s plans to liberalize their profession. Members of the Greek Pharmaceutical Association are due to meet on October 2 to decide whether to take nationwide action against the plans. The pharmacists are also protesting the fact that they are owed a combined 400 million euros by the civil servants’ social security fund, OPAD. Homeless shelter Athens Mayor Nikitas Kaklamanis and Archbishop Ieronymos yesterday inaugurated a new shelter for the homeless on Patission Street, near central Athens. The Hotel for the Homeless, as the establishment has been named, is located in a building bequeathed to the City of Athens by an Istanbul-based Greek, Lena Pantelidou. The shelter has a capacity of 60 beds in single and double rooms, private bathroom facilities and also provides medical and psychological support staff for residents. US ambassador The new US ambassador to Greece, Daniel Bennett Smith, yesterday presented his credentials to Greek President Karolos Papoulias at the Presidential Palace in Athens. Smith, who most recently served as executive secretary of the State Department, was sworn in as the new ambassador to Greece on September 7 by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Thwarted holdup Police in Iraklio, Crete, yesterday were questioning a 42-year-old man alleged to have used a pair of garden shears to hold up a street kiosk in the coastal village of Voutes. Passers-by came to the kiosk owner’s aid and members of the police’s motorcycle-riding DIAS squad patrolling the area subsequently arrested the suspect. Contraband smokes Port Authority officials in Patra yesterday confiscated dozens of cardboard boxes containing more than 160,000 packs of contraband cigarettes from a truck that had been due to board a ferry to Italy. Officials detained the truck driver for questioning. Turkish vessel A Turkish navy vessel passed by Cape Sounio, southeast of Athens, yesterday, Greek navy officials said yesterday. The Beykoz, a French-built B-class corvette, had set sail from the Turkish port of Aksaz and passed through the southern and central Aegean before reaching Cape Sounio. The Greek navy said that it would continue to monitor the ship’s movements.

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