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Athens News Agency: News in English (PM), 98-12-28
NEWS IN ENGLISH
Athens, Greece, 28/12/1998 (ANA)
MAIN HEADLINES
- Fog shuts down Thessaloniki airport
- Northern Greece shivers to coldest winter in years
- Two young men found dead in Florina
- Monday morning begins with three robberies
- New electricity line to prevent power outages
- Police seek man transporting illegal immigrants
- Weather
- Foreign Exchange
NEWS IN DETAIL
Fog shuts down Thessaloniki airport
Thessaloniki's international airport was once again this morning closed due
to fog, with one flight from Athens to Belgrade via Thessaloniki cancelled
and three others from Athens to Stuttgart, Munich and London going ahead
without making the scheduled stopover. Greece's second biggest airport is
plagued by problems due to fog in winter every year. It is hoped that a
modern electronic system which enables "blind" landings will solve the
problem.
Northern Greece shivers to coldest winter in years
Northern Greece bore the brunt of one of the coldest winters in recent
memory, with the mercury falling to as low as -15 Celsius. Snow stopped
falling on Sunday but the bitter cold caused frost overnight and, combined
with fog, made driving on the region's roads particularly hazardous. The
Kastoria lake has frozen over in a number of places for the first time in
almost a decade. Temperatures fell to -15 in Florina, -10 in Kastoria, -5
in Kozani and -3 in Thessaloniki. At midday on Monday, the temperature in
Florina had risen to a warmer -10, and to -5 in Kastoria.
Two young men found dead in Florina
Two young men were found dead in a basement garage in the northern Greek
town of Florina, police said. Spyros Zafeiridis, 20, and Kyriakos
Paschalidis, 19, were found on Monday morning in Zafeiridis's car by the 20-
year-old's father. Police are investigating the cause of death.
Monday morning begins with three robberies
Two banks and a supermarket were held up in Athens on Monday, the robbers
netting a total of more than 26 million drachmas. Two masked men, one armed
with a sawn-off shotgun and the other a pistol, threatened customers and
staff at a branch of the Commercial Bank in Peristeri, Athens before
escaping with 4 million drachmas. One man armed with a revolver held up a
branch of the Bank of Attica in Neos Kosmos, Athens and grabbed 1,200,000
drachmas from the counter before making his getaway. In another incident
this morning, two masked men armed with pistols held up the "Bazaar"
supermarket in Zografou and stole 21,500,000 drachmas.
New electricity line to prevent power outages
Development Minister Vasso Papandreou on Monday attended a ceremony marking
the beginning of the operation of a third high voltage electricity line at
Kryoneri, north of Athens. The new north-south line, whose construction was
vehemently opposed by local residents, who claimed it was a health risk, is
designed to eliminate the risk of a black-out during times of heavy power
demand. The new line will transmit electrical power from northern Greece to
the south and, particularly, to the Attica basin, which is home to 38
percent of the country's total population and consumes 36 percent of
electrical power.
Police seek man transporting illegal immigrants
Police in northern Greece are looking for an unidentified man who managed
to escape after the hearse he was driving was stopped after a high-speed
chase and the occupants of the vehicle turned out to be seven illegal
immigrants from Albania. The incident took place in Kastoria, when the
suspicions of the officers of a joint army and police patrol were aroused
by the hearse and they gave chase. They managed to corner the vehicle near
the village of Kaloneri, Kozani but the driver managed to escape in the
darkness. According to police figures, 52,530 illegal immigrants were
arrested near the Greek-Albanian border in 1998 and sent back to Albania.
WEATHER
Greece will be overcast today with possibility of local showers in Crete
and the Dodecanese Islands and a slight rise in temperatures throughout the
country. Athens will be partly cloudy with temperatures between 1-11C. The
same for Thessaloniki with temperatures from -3 to 6C.
FOREIGN EXCHANGE
Monday's rates (buying) U.S. dollar 279.397
British pound 468.065 Japanese yen (100) 240.848
French franc 49.610 German mark 166.358
Italian lira (100) 16.800 Irish Punt 413.466
Belgian franc 8.066 Finnish mark 54.729
Dutch guilder 147.629 Danish kr. 43.731
Austrian sch. 23.664 Spanish peseta 1.955
Swedish kr. 34.686 Norwegian kr. 36.404
Swiss franc 203.613 Port. Escudo 1.623
Aus. dollar 171.507 Can. dollar 180.147
(M.P.)
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