Antenna: News in English (PM), 98-03-17

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From: Antenna Radio <http://www.antenna.gr> - email: [email protected]

Last Updated: Tuesday, 17-Mar-98 21:43:19

CONTENTS

[01] Drachmae-devaluation

[02] Drachmae-Foreign press

[03] Vietnam-My Lai

[04] Kosovo

[05] Weather

[06] SEGAS-Track

[07] Mikis Theodorakis

[01] Drachmae-devaluation

Kostas Simitis said the devaluation was necessary as part of getting the drachma ready for the European single currency. But there are many critics.

During a visit to Prague, the Greek leader said there will be no NEW belt- tighening measures to prevent a resurgence of inflation. But economic policies he's been implementing will be implemented much more quickly.

The devaluation touched off fears not only of inflation, but of higher interest rates and, consequently, fewer investments. But the prime minister believes that interest rates will come down in June.

So far, the stock market has not been adversely affected by the devaluation: it closed 7 per cent up Tuesday, bringing this week's gains to 14 per cent.

Money markets were fairly stable over the first two days since the devaluation. The drachma is about 12 per cent off against the dollar and the Deutsch mark compared to last Friday.

Some of those hit hardest by the devaluation are people who need to travel abroad, for studies or other reasons. One woman who needs to go to London regularly for medical reasons says the British pound is now prohibitively expensive.

In Pasok, some of Simitis's opponents are critical of the devaluation. MP Stelios Papathemelis says Greeks were asked to make sacrifices in the name of a strong drachma for so long; now they're being asked to make sacrifices in the name of a weak drachma.

And opposition parties are scathing. New Democracy MP Miltiades Evert met with the nation's president Tuesday, saying finance minister Iannos Papantoniou should leave office.

Evert incited Papantoniou's wrath in parliament, when he pointed out that the finance minister's daughter works for the bank that recently brokered a one-billion dollar loan to Greece from US banks.

Papantoniou called the insinuation of corruption slanderous.

[02] Drachmae-Foreign press

The drachma was stable on Wall Street Tuesday, as investors returned to the Greek currency after a sell off last Friday. Some analysts believe the drachma fall will boost the number of Americans vacationing in Greece this summer.

The Financial Times of London highlights the the boom in Athens stocks following the devaluation.

The German newspaper Frankfurter Algemaine says the devaluation enhances Greece's chances of joining the Euro currency.

Greece will NOT be joining the Euro in the first round. Foreign minister Theodoros Pangalos has invited Britain and the other European Union countries not joining the Euro to band together to ensure that they aren't excluded from the decision-making process on major economic issues before the rest of the EU.

ALL EU members should participate equally in decision-making, adds Pangalos, whether they've joined the common currench or not.

So what does the future hold for the drachma? The Wall Street Journal says there could be another devaluation next year.

The Financial Times, though, thinks the currency will hold its own.

[03] Vietnam-My Lai

On the 30th anniversary of what is known as the My Lai massacre, Antenna's Alexandra Spyridaki travelled to New Orleans, to talk to one of the men in US uniform in My Lai that day.

It was Ron Raitenor who brought the massacre to public attention in the US.

When Ron Raitenour went home after his tour in Vietnam, he was 23. And he was haunted by the memory of the hundreds of civilians gunned down by his company in My Lai.

"I went home, back to Phoenix and sat down with my parents and told them this terrible story...to try and expose it...I felt an obligation to do that.... writing this letter".

A year after the massacre, Raitenor wrote a letter to the Pentagon. Investigations ensued, but they were a mere formality. If he hadn't gone to the press, then the story would probably never have come to the attention of the world.

As it was, Lieutenant William Calley, leader of the company that had carried out the raid on My Lai, was court-martialled. He was sentenced to life in prison, for the murder of quote 109 Asiatic human beings, unquote, but he never spent a day in prison. After he served some of the time under house arrest, his sentence was wiped away in 1975.

Something Riatenour regrets.

"Did he pay the price Nazi war criminals.... obviously not". "Is it the same?" "We're still...what's different except...shooters were Americans. There's no difference that I can see...this deception allowed the continuation of these policies".

Calley's sentence may have been wiped away, but the doubts about US policy remain.

"I don't think it was an isolated incident....I think that massacres were a tool that were used by the higher command". "Was it an American tragedy?" "ultimately...we lost 55 thousand people. The Vietnamese lost over 2 million. So....we conducted the war on their ground".

[04] Kosovo

The US is also trying to get ethnic Albanians and the Serbs to the negotiating table.

Earlier this month, Serb police units backed by tanks and artillery raided a number of ethnic Albanian villages in Kosovo - the southernmost province of the rump Yugoslavia. Belgrade says its attacks were directed at separatists. But scores of Men, women, and children were killed by the police.

A week after the police action stopped, with some 80 ethnic Albanians reportedly dead, the Serbs are still trying in vain to get the leaders of Kosovo's Albanians to the talking table.

But the ethnic Albanians - 90 per cent of Kosovo's population of two million - are rejecting Belgrade's offer of talks.

They are enraged by the murder of some 80 civilians - men, women, and children - and exasperated after a decade in which they say they've been deprived of their rights by Belgrade, appear unwilling to discuss anything.

A decade after ending the autonomy, the province enjoyed under Tito, Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevich is offering Kosovo some autonomy once again.

But the ethnic Albanian leaders, perhaps holding out for the best terms they can get, say only independence will do.

Depsite appeals from the US and Russia Tuesday, the ethnic Albanians refused for the fourth time in six days to sit down with a delegation from Belgrade.

And they say if any talks are held, then foreign mediators must be present.

But Milosevich rejects the idea of foreign brokers - Kosovo is, he says, an internal matter.

A few days ago, 16-year-old Riad TsasAri told Antenna's Antonis Fourlis of moments of horror at the hands of the Serbs during the recent assault on his village, Prekaz.

"My family and four other families were sitting in a room when the police rocket attack started and the roof caved in", he recalls from his hospital bed.

"The police ordered us to go outside one by one. When we were outside, they separated us into two groups, the women and children in one, the men in the other. Next they executed the men".

The police, who'd painted tiger stripes on their faces, told those still alive to leave the area.

"But we'd gone no more than 15 metres when they opened fire on us", relates Riad, lucky to be alive after being shot four times.

Unless the two sides can be brought together to find a peaceful solution to their differences in Kosovo, there may be more killing ahead.

The last wave of violence started on February 28th, when ethnic Albanian separatists shot dead four Serb policemen.

Yugoslav sources reported Tuesday that another policeman had been slightly injured in a grenade attack 50 kilometres west of Pristina.

[05] Weather

A week after people rejoiced in the arrival of spring and started checking their sun tan lotion supplies, the young at heart frolicked in bountiful but quick-melting snow in the elevated suburbs.

Schools in many areas were closed. Tuesday morning there was little traffic going anywhere without snowchains in the hilly suburbs.

There weren't any snowballs being rolled in central Athens, but there were flakes to be seen falling.

Snow fell heavily in many other parts of Greece, and the weatherman says people should bundle up, the wintry weather will continue until the weekend.

[06] SEGAS-Track

The two young athletes were awarded for winning gold medals at last month's European Indoor Track and Field Championships in Spain.

Pavlakakis, who finished first in the men's 60 metres, and Koffa, the gold medalist in the women's 200 metres, were presented with plaques and received cheques from a large sportswear compnay they've agreed to promote.

[07] Mikis Theodorakis

A labour of love, the album is a compilation of 26 songs spanning three decades, from 1950 to 1980.

At the launch Theodorakis told Alexia, "Working with you has a been a delight. It was a tough battle for both of us. But as they say pain links us with God".

For Alexia, working with Theodorakis makes the sacrifice inherent in hard work worth it: She said working with the composer was like being in school. She's learnt a lot - and is still learning from him.

(c) ANT1 Radio 1998

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