Athens Macedonian News Agency: News in English, 14-06-25

Athens News Agency: News in English Directory - Previous Article - Next Article

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

CONTENTS

[01] FM Venizelos meets his Turkish counterpart Davutoglu

[02] Three suspects in major heroin case testify on Wednesday

[03] Greek trade deficit widens in April

[01] FM Venizelos meets his Turkish counterpart Davutoglu

In statements after the meeting, Venizelos said that they made a political review of the bilateral relations and a brief reference to the regional situation "because we face many open problems that concern us" related to migrants, but "they also concern us because there is an issue of regional stability and international peace."

Venizelos also stressed that they talked about all open issues and agreed to use the channels of political and diplomatic communication to deal with practical issues, but mainly in order to prepare very specific steps in the context of international law and in particular the international law of the sea.

[02] Three suspects in major heroin case testify on Wednesday

The Iranian was due to testify on Tuesday but requested and received a one-day extension. In his testimony, the Iranian allegedly claimed that he boarded the tanker and the heroin shipment was loaded in international waters between Pakistan and Oman from a supply boat. He also alleged that he was going to receive 50 mln Iranian reals for the job.

According to information the Greek has allegedly helped in the heroin's transfer to Philothei.

On Tuesday, four crew members of the tanker "Noor One", that was used to smuggle into Greece the mammoth heroin shipments of over two tonnes seized by the Greek authorities a few days ago in separate sting operations, were remanded in custody following a unanimous decision by the prosecutor and the examining magistrate assigned to the case.

The suspects, all from India, denied any involvement in the case but were unable to convince the investigating authorities.

[03] Greek trade deficit widens in April

The Hellenic Statistical Authority in a report released on Wednesday said that the value of import-arrivals totalled 3.634 billion euros in April from 3.930 billion euros in April last year, recording a 7.5 pct drop (excluding oil products the value of imports fell 3.8 pct).

The value of export-deliveries totalled 2.021 billion euros in April, from 2.553 billion in April last year, posting a 20.8 pct decrease (excluding oil products the value of exports fell 12.4 pct).

The trade deficit widened by 17.2 pct to 1.614 billion euros in April, from 1.377 billion in the year-ago period (excluding oil products the trade deficit widened by 7.8 pct).

The value of import-arrivals in the January-April period totalled 15.507 billion euros, down 1.6 pct compared with the same period last year (excluding oil products the value of imports rose 7.4 pct).

The value of export-deliveries amounted to 8.399 billion euros in the first four months of the year, down 7.8 pct from the same period last year (excluding oil products the value of exports fell by 6.5 pct).

The trade deficit totalled 7.109 billion euros in the January-April period, up 6.8 pct from last year (excluding oil products the trade deficit widened by 25.4 pct).

Athens News Agency: News in English Directory - Previous Article - Next Article