Antenna: News in English (PM), 98-04-09

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From: Antenna Radio <http://www.antenna.gr> - email: antenna@compulink.gr

Last Updated: Thursday, 09-Apr-98 22:05:31

CONTENTS

[01] Santer-Simitis

[02] Konstantinos Karamanlis

[03] Red Cross - exercise

[04] Dinosaurs

[05] "The Revision of the Constitution"

[06] Basketball- playoffs

[01] Santer-Simitis

Entering the ERM meant devaluing the Greek currency by 14 per cent.

But European Commission president Jacques Santer hailed the move after meeting with Greek prime minister Kostas Simitis in Athens Thursday.

Santer said that if the Greek government's austere economic policies continue on course, then the country has a good chance of joining the single European currency.

Eleven European Union countries are scheduled to join the single currency in 1999. Greece, which hasn't yet met the criteria regarding inflation, interest rates, and the size of its public deficit, is expected to enter in the second round, in the year 2001.

Antenna's Giorgos Blavianos and Michalis Psilos pointed out to European Commission president Jacques Santer that in the case of two countries entering in the first round - Belgium and Italy - some flexibility has been shown, the requirements fudged, to let them in.

Santer said Belgium and Italy appear to meet the requirements regarding the percentage ratio of their public debt to GNP. The same rule of measure will be used in Greece's case, he promised, but declined to make any predictions about what will happen next year.

Antenna's reporters pointed out that the Greek people have made great economic sacrifices in the drive to achieve the economic numbers the EU requires for admission to the single currency. What, they asked Santer, is his advice to ordinary Greeks? Should they just be patient?

"Any nation that wants to continue to be a part of the EU's unending process of economic and monetary union needs a healthy economy", said Santer. "Economic and monetary union are a political, economic, and social tool. The criteria set will lead EU members to higher levels of productivity, and more investments. What's important to us", explained Santer, "is our industries becoming more competitive, and that's what we're interested in achieving in Greece. People need to patient, but also unwavering in their support for the efforts underway to strengthen the Greek ecnomy.

[02] Konstantinos Karamanlis

Karamanlis entered an Athens hospital Tuesday with a minor respiratory tract infection and a fever.

His personal physician says he's responding well to anti-biotics and is recovering rapidly.

[03] Red Cross - exercise

Such staged events makes such a strong psychological impact on the volunteers that many professionals even advise counselling for participants.

It's hard to tell if the accident is real or not. Even for participants, Red Cross volunteers who come to play the victims.

Red Cross trainer Anastasios Gerasimatos explains that in exercises like this the mock accident victims have an array of injuries.

For trainees, it provides valuable rescue and first aid experience.

The victims are told to play their role to the hild, which includes allowing themselves to create an atmosphere governed by panic and hysteria.

After the exercise was over, some volunteers had trouble stepping out of their roles. "I can't calm down, I'm still caught up in it", said one woman.

Psychotherapist Maria Pyrounaki-Lioni says it's possible for victims to be so sucked in that they actually believe they've been in an accident.

[04] Dinosaurs

One of the scientists at the forefront of research into dramatic events that may have led to the demise of the dinosaurs and the end of a geological age, is Greek geologist Aphrodite Indarre.

She and her team have been studying rock formations in Canada that they believe have much to tell us about the earth's past.

The Manicouagan Reservoir in eastern Canada may have a diameter of 200 kilometres; but it may have a story of epoch significance to tell.

Geologists like Aphrodite Indarre believe the rock layers here hold the secret of what happened to the dinosaurs and why the earth's climate dramatically changed millions of years ago.

Indarre and her team live in four tents, and have a fifth, larger, tent to eat, socialise, and work in.

She believes that the reservoir was created by an enormous meteorite, which today forms the island in its centre.

The most telling piece of evidence supporting her view, she believes, is the fact that the superficial rock layers came under tremendous pressure at some time in the geological past, pressure so great that the molecular structure of the rocks were altered.

Greek cameraman Chronis Pechlivanides and sound engineer Giorgos Philipaios visited Inarre at her camp.

"We're studying the rock structures and their chemical composition", she explains, "to learn how it is that they were formed so deep under the surface and then moved up toward the surface. Milions of years ago there were high mountains here, like the Himalayas are today. But the mountains here were so much older than the Himalayas that in time it was worn away - all we see today are the remaining hills. That means it's easy for us to see what formed the base of those high mountains".

Indarre, like many other geologists, believes that the dramatic changes which radically altered the earth's climate and its flora and fauna millions of years ago were the result of major cosmic events - like large meteorites pounding into the earth's surface, throwing the earth off its axis and even its rotational path, thus altering the distance separating the different bodies in our galaxy from each other.

The fact that the rock formations being studied in Manicouagan are among the earth's oldest puts Indarre and the other geologists working there on the cutting edge of geological research.

[05] "The Revision of the Constitution"

Venizelos, a constitutional law professor, has just launched his book "The Revision of the Constitution".

Subtitled "a Complete Plan for Greece for the 21st Century", it is a guide for all those who want to familiarise themselves with the issues

in the revision debate.

Venizelos says the changes parliament will make to the constitutional constitute a major political event, one which should be of concern to all Greeks, as the alterations will affect many aspects of their lives.

[06] Basketball- playoffs

Sporting played host to Panionios in game two of their best-of-three series. Panionios the winner in game one.

With its back up against the wall Sporting gives it the old college try, and is down by just five points with seven minutes to go in the game. But Panionios's superiority shines through, as it sweeps the series with an 85- 74 triumph. Panionios goes on to meet Aek in the quarterfinals.

(c) ANT1 Radio 1998

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