Subject: News I - Thu, 19 Aug 1993
From: zarros@turing.scs.carleton.ca (Theodoros Sp. Zarros)

        Athens News Agency Bulletin, August 19, 1993
        ============================================

	Alexandroupolis, 19/8/1993 (ANA - K. Christodoulou / D.
Petrovic / Reuters):   Over 1,000 ethnic Greeks evacuated from
Georgia's Abkhazia province to escape civil strife and start new
life arrived in Alexandroupolis early yesterday morning after a
55-hour sea journey. Carrying only a few belongings in
suitcases, bundles and cardboard boxes, the ethnic Greeks
arrived in Alexandroupolis aboard the Greek cruise ship
"Viscountess" which delivered 31 tonnes of humanitarian aid to
the once-bustling Black Sea resort of Sukhumi.

	"I left everything back because of this stupid war. If shelling
wasn't enough, looters broke in my house in the middle of the
night and took all my money and valuables, "Stathis Yannides,
who arrived with his wife and baby daughter, told Reuters. "I
thank Greece for giving me another chance". The evacuees were
greeted by Foreign Under-secretary Virginia Tsouderou, National
Defence Under-secretary Ioannis Stathopoulos and the president
National Foundation for the Resettlement of Refugees, George
Iacovou. "The government is determined to exert every effort to
make your settlement here as easy as possible", Ms Tsouderou
said at a special welcoming ceremony in Alexandroupolis.

	In addition to helping the evacuees find housing and work, the
government will also organise language classes and provide other
assistance for the Pontians' resettlement. Noting that the
ethnic Greeks were on the threshold of a new beginning, Ms
Tsouderou said she discerned their "willingness and
determination to settle and prosper in this blessed land". "You
are now safe in Greece, a place of peace, where all the Greek
people embrace and welcome you", she added. Ms Tsouderou said
that the "perfectly organised" operation for the Pontians'
evacuation had been made possible by "the steady determination
and staunch political will of the Greek government".

	The evacuation, code-named Operation Golden Fleece, was
organised by the Greek government despite an easing of
hostilities between Georgian troops and Abkhazian separatists
after a year of civil war. "Even if the war stops, I won't go
back. My house was destroyed from shellings. There is no food,
no love, just constant terror", said Maria Gialanzides who hopes
to find some distant relatives in Greece to help her start a new
life. The Pontian Greeks will be temporarily housed in camps
near refugee reception centres set up at Elassona and Olympus
before being transferred to permanent settlements in Thrace.
Early yesterday afternoon, groups of evacuees left
Alexandroupolis on chartered buses for temporary reception
centres in Dikaia, Soufli, Thessaloniki, Larisa and Fthiotida.

	Government officials say there are about 500,000 ethnic Greeks
in the former Soviet Union. About 100,000 are in Georgia and an
estimated 12,000 have emigrated to Greece since 1989. Greeks
were among the first inhabitants of present-day Georgia, which
local legend has it was the home of the Golden Fleece of ancient
Greek legend. Greek merchants traded on the Black Sea coast more
than 3,000 years ago. The first recorded settlement at now
battle-scarred Sukhumi had the Greek name Diaskuria. More Greeks
settled in the area in the 19th and early 20th centuries,
fleeing homes in north-eastern Turkey to escape wars. Georgian
Greeks were forcibly resettled by then Soviet leader Joseph
Stalin in the 1930s when the army moved whole villages from the
Black Sea to remote Soviet republics.


	Athens, 19/8/1993 (ANA)  Greece will receive 650,000 European
currency units in emergency aid from the European Community,
National Economy Under-secretary Aristides Tsiplakos said
yesterday. A ministry announcement said the EC Commission had
approved 500,000 ECU (560,000 dollars) in emergency aid for the
victims of the Patras earthquake and 150,000 ECU (168,000
dollars) for the victims of the recent forest fires on Samos and
Ikaria.        On July 14, an earthquake measuring 5.4 on the
open-ended Richter scale shook the port city of Patras, causing
extensive damage to dozens of buildings. Twelve people were
killed and more than 30 homes gutted in a blaze that broke out
on Ikaria on July 31. At least three homes and 3,000 stremmas of
forest and farm land were burned in a fire on Samos the
following day.


	Melbourne, 19/8/1993 (ANA - S. Hatzimanolis):   Four members of
the Greek Parliament and four members of the Cyprus House of
Representatives will participate in the 90th conference of the
Interparliamentary Union to be held in Canberra September 13-18.
New Democracy deputy Apostolos Kratsas, Panhellenic Socialist
Movement (PASOK) deputy Ioannis Pottakis, Coalition of the Left
and Progress deputy Grigoris Farakos and Communist Party of
Greece (KKE) deputy will represent Greece at the meeting. The
Cypriot delegation will include DISY deputy Nikos Anastasiades,
EDEK deputy Yiannakis Omirou, DIKO deputy Aristos Chrysostomou
and AKEL deputy Andreas Filippou.