Athens News Agency: News in English, 06-07-15

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From: The Athens News Agency at <http://www.ana.gr/>

CONTENTS

[01] PM wraps up visit to Lefkas

[02] First Greeks back from strife-torn Lebanon

[03] 9th Symi Symposium opens on Samos Sunday

[04] Papariga: Palestinians the victims of genocide

[05] PASOK's Papoutsis ends Cyprus trip

[01] PM wraps up visit to Lefkas

Karamanlis noted the 2003 earthquake had caused extensive damage to Lefkas, which had in any case suffered years of neglect.

He said that the New Democracy government, fulfilling its pledges, had from April 2004 drafted a specific plan for the island's recovery and the damage to the roads had now been repaired, while important works of infrastructure had been completed.

The island was "turning a new page" and had last year seen an increase in tourist traffic, Karamanlis added, stressing that Lefkas and Greek regions could be optimistic about the future.

On Saturday morning, the prime minister visited the Lefkas Prefecture authority and held talks with Lefkas Prefect Yiannis Lazaris and local officials.

Karamanlis had arrived on the island on Friday in order to address the opening night of a three-day festival organised by ND's youth group ONNED.

In his speech, he had stressed that "upgrading education, the upgrading of the state university is the basic priority of the government over the coming period."

"We are promoting reforms that strengthen the social role of higher education, that guarantee more opportunities, secure degrees for work, success, social and professional accomplishment, degrees that will have an upgraded value both in our country and in European and world competition," he added.

Karamanlis further said that "we are working and cooperating to enable all of us to build together a qualitative and productive education that will help young women and young men to gain the opportunities that appear and achieve their targets, to realise your dreams."

The prime minister pointed out that changes are necessary "because no educational system can be surpassed by the continuous production of knowledge, it cannot remain distant from what is taking place on the international scene, it cannot remain static and produce unemployed people with degrees".

"We have set high targets and we are achieving them one by one," the prime minister underlined.

Karamanlis said that the traditional advantages of the country are becoming more competitive, Greece is becoming an international energy corridor and the centre of high quality services in tourism, trade, transport, shipping, health, education and culture. "The government's policies are already producing tangible results," he said.

"The dramatic deficits of the past are being limited drastically. Growth is proceeding at rates that are more than double the eurozone average, the competitiveness of the economy, following many years of recession, has already gained eight positions in the international ranking in the past year, the extroversion of the economy is becoming a reality, exports are increasing at unprecedented rates, the tourist industry is recording a considerable improvement, unemployment has begun to decrease, employment is increasing, the climate is improving all over the country and Greece is in a new growth orbit," the prime minister stressed.

Karamanlis also said that the policy of separation into "two Greeces has been left to the past and the conception of the one and the other Greece has been brushed aside."

Earlier, the prime minister visited the museum at the Panagia Faneromeni Monastery in Lefkada, while on Saturday morning he will be visiting the island's prefecture.

[02] First Greeks back from strife-torn Lebanon

The 90-odd passengers on board the plane had travelled by road to Damascus from Beirut and other areas of Lebanon, where an Israeli offensive was continuing at unreduced intensity.

Special Olympic Airlines (OA) flight 3148 took off from Athens for Damascus in the early hours of Saturday, where it was due to pick up some 90 passengers, including Greek foreign ministry staff. As well as Greeks, it also carried several citizens of third countries that had requested the assistance of the Greek Embassy in Beirut in order to get out of besieged Lebanon. These included at least 20 Cypriots, eight French nationals, two Britons, one U.S. citizen, a Czech, an Italian and five people with dual nationality.

The airplane took off from Damascus shortly after 11:00 on Saturday morning headed for Larnaca airport on Cyprus, where it let off 22 of the people on board, before continuing the journey to Athens.

According to Deputy Foreign Minister Theodoros Kassimis, meanwhile, a second OA aircraft is preparing to depart for Damascus on Saturday evening to evacuate another 64 Greeks and 46 Cypriots and 26 citizens of other nationalities that are fleeing Lebanon by road.

He said the 136-person group was being led by a Lebanese police vehicle via a safe route to the Lebanon-Syria border, where they would be picked up by Greek diplomats and led to Damascus airport.

[03] 9th Symi Symposium opens on Samos Sunday

The principle theme of this year's Symposium is 'Creative Cities in the 21st Century: How to Nurture Change, Growth and Sustainable Development.'

Participants will explore issues such as encouraging citizens to participate in civic governance; creating pluralistic communities; the impact of technology and migration on urban environment; and how urban planning affects development, the environment, and quality of life on both a local and global level.

The Symi Symposium, named after the island of Symi, brings together progressive politicians, academics, activists, and entrepreneurs to exchange views on some of the most important issues on the global agenda.

The symposium proceedings will be completed on Friday, July 21 with the presentation of its conclusions by the president of PASOK.

Among this yearâs participants are, Socialist International Secretary Luis Ayala, UNDP administrator Kemal Dervis, Swedenâs Education Minister Leif Pagrotsky, 1998 Economics Nobel Prize winner professor Amartya K. Sen, Bulgarian Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev.

[04] Papariga: Palestinians the victims of genocide

"Today, we find ourselves literally before a genocide against the Palestinian people and, as always, with the familiar Israeli pretexts," Papariga said, while noting that certain events, such as these, showed that "sooner or later, for all peoples - and of course for the Greek people - the question will finally arise: submission or resistance and counter-attack?"

According to KKE's leader, the dilemma also extended to people fighting for their right to have their own country and state and the ordinary, everyday rights of workers to jobs, education, healthcare etc.

"These things are all connected. And this is exactly what has happened," she said.

She slammed the United States, the European Union and the powerful EU countries - as well as the government and main opposition parties in Greece - for their "hypocritical" call to the two sides to show restraint and their weak admonitions to Israel to "moderate its violence".

According to Papariga, the world's powerful were essentially protesting against the Palestinians using even the simplest means to defend their rights by a massively superior and ruthless foe. In the same way, the people of Europe and the workers in Greece were faced with similar ultimatums in their everyday life, between giving up labour rights and other social gains or facing "chaos and destruction", she added..

She again called on the government and the main opposition Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), as well as PASOK president George Papandreou who is now president of the Socialist International, to condemn Israel for what it was doing to Palestine and Lebanon and for what it was preparing to do to Syria.

[05] PASOK's Papoutsis ends Cyprus trip

In talks with the Cyprus President, Papoutsis outlined PASOK's positions for a new approach for solving the Cyprus problem, which would be compatible with Community practice, EU treaties and European law so that it did not create problems in the future.

In every case, it was important to contribute in every way and support every initiative that would bring a joint European future of Greek-Cypriots and Turkish-Cypriots closer, he said.

Papoutsis also attended Cyprus Parliament sessions commemorating the anniversaries of the coup and the Turkish invasion that led to Cyprus' occupation, while earlier he laid a wreath on the monument to those fallen during the coup on behalf of PASOK leader George Papandreou.

He concluded his contacts in Nicosia by meeting the president of the EDEK party Yiannis Omirou.

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