NEWS IN DETAIL

British foreign minister fears war over Cyprus

Mr Rifkind, speaking on BBC Radio, also accused Athens and Ankara of lacking the political will to find a solution.

"When relations are already bad and tense and difficult and both sides appear to be looking for an excuse to make them worse, that is pretty grim, " he said.

Asked whether there might be conflict between Greece and Turkey in the Aegean, Mr Rifkind said: "It has to be a serious possibility."

"I am not as confident as logic would imply because there has been a real lack of political will on both sides," he said.

Britain expressed alarm last month over a Greek Cypriot decision to buy Russian surface-to-air missiles, saying it could destabilise what is already one of the most heavily militarised areas of the world.

On a visit to the divided island in December, Mr Rifkind told Greek Cypriot leaders the planned purchase would be a "big step in the wrong direction."

Commission sees positive results in Greek economy

However, the Commission insists on the ascertainment that Greek public deficits have a structural nature, and for this reason structural policies are required to remedy existing fiscal imbalances.

According to reports, the special chapter on the development of the Greek economy in 1996 is not expected to have major changes, additions and corrections reshaping its present content, but will contain predictions expressing satisfaction over the gover nment's efforts and estimates of a 2.4 per cent growth rate in the country over the past year.

On the question of inflation, the report assesses an average of 6.9 per cent for 1997 and does not expect unemployment to exceed 9 per cent of the working population.

The European Commission also hails a package of measures implemented by the government, for the first time in the country's history, and aimed at reducing public expenditures. The Commission anticipates that this initiative will result in almost the dou bling of the GDP's primary surplus in 1997 as against 1996, which in turn will contribute to a decrease in the country's excessive public debt.

Open Skies Treaty trial flights scheduled over Larisa

Observers from Russia, Ukraine, Romania, Italy and Spain have been invited to attend the flights.

The Open Skies Treaty was signed in Helsinki on March 24, 1992, and establishes a system of overflights over all territory of participant countries, which aims to achieving transparency on military activities. This facilitates control regarding compliance with existing or future agreements on controlling and reducing armaments, while the possibility of preventing conflicts is also provided.

In this context, every signatory is obliged to accept a number of photo reconnaissance flights, and at the same time it has the right to perform an equal number of flights over other countries. Two or more countries can cooperate in observation flights.

Countries having ratified the treaty include Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Britain, Georgia, Italy, Kirgizhstan, Luxembourg, Norway, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey, the United States , Hungary and Iceland.

Greek Parliament ratified the treaty on March 20, 1993.

Russia, Ukraine and Belarus are expected to follow suit and ratify to enable the treaty to be fully implemented.

Health care reforms unveiled

Mr. Geitonas described the bill as "realistic," adding that it complies with the government's pre-election promises regarding the health care sector.

He also stressed the need for immediate measures to improve both hospital premises and services, at the same time drawing attention to an existing 95- billion drachma project to construct, restore and expand hospitals in Macedonia and Thrace.

Health Undersecretary Manolis Skoulakis also announced the creation of a new detoxification unit.

According to the bill, the Council will convene every three months.

Striking teachers take continuing mobilisations to downtown Athens

Protesting teachers' morale appeared to be high as the fourth week of strike actions began, with strikers enjoying a concert outside the ministry before marching off to Parliament and then to the finance ministry.

Meanwhile, Education Undersecretary Yiannis Anthopoulos told reporters that making up for lost school time by extending the school year "was an extreme situation", and that there were other ways to deal with the situation.

"These methods will be discussed with the teachers when their strike ends and schools reopen," he said.

Asked whether there were any margins for improving teachers' wages, one of their main demands, Mr. Anthopoulos said if teachers accepted a proposal put forward by the president of the teachers' federation, Nikos Tsoulias, then they would see a rise in total yearly income of between 400,000-900, 000 drachmas.

However, the administrative board of OLME, the high school teachers' union, decided yesterday to propose to a general assembly meeting today that the strike continue for a fifth week.

A final decision will be taken tomorrow, at a meeting of the heads of local teacher unions.

Public childcare centres

An announcement said a 48-hour strike had been called for Feb. 12-13 and a three-day strike for Feb. 19-21.

State film award winners announced

The first three prizes for feature-length films went to Andreas Patzis for "Slaughtering the Rooster", to Yannis Smaragdis for "Cavafy" and to Yannis Typaldos for "Terra Incognita".

Prize for best documentary went to G. Zervas and G. Papaconstantinou for "When Chagall cost less than a kilo of potatoes".

The prizes will be awarded at a special event to be held within the next few weeks in Thessaloniki.

EU reports 45,000 deaths, 1.5 million injuries from road accidents per year

Based on recent figures, the European Union is facing up to the grim reality of 45,000 deaths and 1.5 million injuries from road accidents every year, which is also translated into socio-economic costs of Ecu162 billion.

The figure, double the EU's annual fiscal budget, calls for a common handling of the problem by all European Union partners, and the European Council for Safety and Transport (ETSC) has proposed a "strategic plan for EU road safety" with the aim of decr easing casualties to 25,000 by the year 2010.

The plan provides for establishment of various road safety-related information systems as well as a series of measures.

Research reveals improvement of women's position in the workplace

Research on the workforce's adaptation to industrial change was carried out on chemical, paper, plastics, tobacco and wood industries in Macedonia and Thrace.

According to the research, specialisations in which employers will be most interested in over the next five years will be computing, managment and business administration.

OA, Hertz offers special fly-drive deal

Macedonia-Thrace Bank enters EU investment programme

The programme's beneficiaries are the small- and medium-sized enterprises of EU member-states and their financial support will be anticipated for establishing, in cooperation with local partners, joint enterprises headquartered in central and eastern Eu ropean countries as well as in the Russian Federation. Investments to be financed include all sectors and business activities.

WEATHER

FOREIGN EXCHANGE

(C.E.)

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