Athens News Agency: News in English, 11-04-13

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

CONTENTS

[01] Former minister gets suspended jail sentence

[02] ADEX closing report

[03] Gov't calls for explanations by Siemens

[04] OTEGlobe-Turk Telecom deal

[05] Stocks end 1.65% higher 

[01] Former minister gets suspended jail sentence

The defendant did not appear in court, while a similar charge for preceding years was written off due to a statute of limitation law.

Mantelis has been implicated in the Siemens kickbacks furor, related to his tenure as a transport and communications minister in the late 1990s.

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[02] ADEX closing report

Volume in futures contracts on equities totaled 11,710 contracts worth 6.692 million euros, with investment interest focusing on National Bankâs contracts (2,983), followed by Eurobank (321), OTE (2,820), Piraeus Bank (913), GEK (1,366), Alpha Bank (647), Motor Oil (202), ATEbank (241) and Cyprus Bank (403).

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[03] Gov't calls for explanations by Siemens

Kastanidis made the announcement while addressing Parliament on the amended ministerial liability law, while he clarified that on Monday he will send a letter to Siemens' management, demanding explanations within the next 15 days.

"The German side has an obligation to compensate the Greek side regardless of the court ruling that will be issued in the Siemens bribery case. The usually judgmental Germans will stand accused, because their own companies are champions of corruption worldwide," Kastanidis said.

Main opposition New Democracy (ND) Parliamentary spokesman Prokopis Pavlopoulos also lashed out at German justice, underlining that the Greek justice system should not take the entire blame for procrastination when, essentially, it was the German justice system that covered up the cases in question.

Opposition Popular Orthodox Rally (LA.O.S) president George Karatzaferis characterised the draft law under discussion as "declaration of remorse delayed by 10 years". He also accused the two major political parties of being responsible for the fact that "nobody was sent to jail and nobody will be". He also stated that former defence minister Akis Tsohatzopoulos should not be the only one to appear before a parliamentary preliminary examination committee.

In response, the ND parliamentary spokesman stated that the payments made by ND ministers were in accordance with contracts signed under the Simitis government.

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[04] OTEGlobe-Turk Telecom deal

Under the agreement, presented by representatives of the two companies, OTEGlobe will offer an additional 250 Gbps (from around 100 Gbps currently) to Turk Telecom through its TBN & GWEN networks, connecting Greece with Europe, through the Balkans and Italy, respectively. "With this upgrade, OTEGlobe continues to cover one-third of the Turkish telecoms operatorâs international interconnection needs, servicing telecommunication traffic from Turkey and its neighboring states," Dinos Andreou, OTEGlobeâc chief executive told reporters.

"An increase in capacity will cover Turk Telecomâs needs for interconnection with European centers," Mihalis Tsamaz, chairman and chief executive of OTE Group said, adding that OTEGlobe was OTEâs ambassador to international markets. (ANA-MPA) --

Andreou declined to offer any financial details of the agreement, but stressed it was a big deal and added that OTEGlobeâs strategic goal was to become a new telecommunications hub in the Mediterranean.

Gokhan Bozkurt, Turk Telecomâs chief executive, said his company was emerging as a hub between Europe and Asia in offering telecoms services, while Hakam Kanafani, chief executive of the Group stressed: "We are confident that Pantelâs international network in Europe combined with the quality and reliable services of OTEGlobe will add value to Turk Telecomâs interconnection with Western Europe". (ANA-MPA)

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[05] Stocks end 1.65% higher

Alpha Bank (0.44 pct) and Jumbo (0.20 pct) were the only blue chip stocks to end lower, while OPAP (3.60 pct), National Bank (3.19 pct), Piraeus Bank (3.03 pct) and Cyprus Bank (2.85 pct) were top gainers. The Travel (3.15 pct), Banks (2.34 pct) and Oil (1.46 pct) sectors scored the biggest percentage gains of the day, while Health (3.23 pct) and Insurance (1.66 pct) suffered losses. Broadly, advancers led decliners by 90 to 56 with another 53 issues unchanged. Altec (20 pct), AEGEK (11.76 pct) and Boutaris (11.11 pct) were top gainers, while Axon Holdings (19.61 pct), Pairis (19.57 pct) and Ridenco (16.67 pct) were top losers.

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