Piraeus couple dead in cancer suicide pact
A Piraeus pharmacist and his companion, a young nurse, were found dead in their flat on Thursday in what police are treating as a suicide pact decided on by the childless couple in the light of the 40-year-old man’s mortal disease, reports said yesterday. The bodies of Filippos Filippakis and Maria Kannavarou, 27, were found by the pharmacist’s mother, who had been away on holiday and dropped by their flat after the couple failed to get in touch, lying side by side on the floor of their Piraeus flat at 50, Sotiros Dios Street. Beside them were two syringes that reportedly contained a lethal chemical cocktail. The couple had left three notes explaining their decision as being the result of their unwillingness to die separately. Filippakis had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and was in the final stages of the disease. A coroner said death had occurred a month before, and ruled out foul play. The government, as Prime Minister Costas Simitis’s speech at the Thessaloniki International Fair indicated, has invested heavily in the case, seeing it as a springboard for a political comeback. It’s no coincidence that its new dogma, as sketched out by the premier, revolves around the idea of security. This is a clear attempt to respond to society’s current conservative momentum, coming across as a guardian of Greece’s households. Simitis is essentially trying to penetrate into the class of conservative urbanites as he did in 1996 and 2000. Back then, his «infiltration» was based on the economy. This time it is security. The government will highlight the issue and try to capitalize on the cracking of terrorism. Time will tell what the result will be.
