Sunday Herald Sun reporter Hamish Heard has revealed that a $20 million lawsuit has been filed by the false rape accuser of former Victorian cabinet minister Theo Theophanous.
The woman, who now lives in Greece, claims Age journalist Carolyn Webb falsified an interview with her that led to a Greek court handing her a two-year suspended jail sentence for criminal defamation in 2009, according to ‘Herald Sun’.
According to the woman suing them, they have refused to provide evidence to the Greek courts that would substantiate the purported interview they published.
Mr. Theophanous was charged and subsequently cleared of the offence. But the allegations ruined his political career, causing him to resign from the cabinet before quitting Parliament.
The woman is seeking $20 million in damages, claiming the article ruined her life, leaving her unemployable in Greece and suffering from mental illness, ‘Herald Sun’ concluded.
In 130 BC, a ship fashioned from the wood of walnut trees, bulging with medicines and Syrian glassware, sank off the coast of Tuscany, Italy. Archaeologists found its precious load 20 years ago and now, for the first time, archaeobotanists have been able to examine and analyse pills that were prepared by the physicians of ancient Greece.
DNA analyses show that each millennia-old tablet is a mixture of more than 10 different plant extracts, from hibiscus to celery.
“Medicinal plants have been identified before, but not a compound medicine, so this is really something new,” says Alain Touwaide, director of the Institute for the Preservation of Medical Traditions, which has the world’s largest digital database of medical manuscripts.
The pills, which researchers believe were diluted with vinegar or water to make them easier to ingest, were preserved inside tin boxes and were the size of coins.
“What is remarkable is that we have written evidence [from the ancient Greeks] of what plants were used for which disorders,” says Alisa Machalek, a science writer for the National Institute of Health, one of the world’s leading research centres.
“This research is interesting, especially for medical historians, because it confirms that what we eat affects our bodies.”
The shift toward synthetic chemical medicines occurred in the 20th Century, but according to Mark Blumenthal, the founder and executive director of the American Botanical Council, there is renewed interest in the medicinal benefits of natural foods – including those found in the pills.
A politician with the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) said over the weekend that debt-burdened Greece is in need of a new image – and proposed giving the country a new name internationally to help it start over.
Jorgos Chatzimarkakis, a German member of the European Parliament, made his remarks to the Bild daily.
“For many in Europe, the name ‘Greece’ stands for a broken political system, nepotism,” said Chatzimarkakis, who is of Greek descent.
“As part of an honest new beginning, the Greek constitution should be rewritten, and the country should be renamed ‘Hellas’ in all languages.” “Hellas” is the name Greeks themselves use for their country.
Chatzimarkakis told the paper that Athens must do away with the current political system and replace it completely. Moreover, he argued that the money Europe is pumping into Greece is going to debt repayment but is not solving the country’s problems.
“Greece needs economic growth,” he said. “Only then can it account for its debts.” (source: the local)
A crucial meeting between Greece’s political leaders on terms demanded by international creditors in exchange for further financial assistance started Sunday in Athens.
Leaders from the Socialists, conservative New Democracy, and small nationalist party Laos arrived at the office of Prime Minister Lucas Papademos in a bid to find common ground on the terms of a second bailout required to prevent Greece from defaulting on its debts.
So far, creditor demands on private-sector wage cuts and further budget spending cuts remain unresolved, while an agreement has been reached on how to recapitalize local lenders and the country’s privatization agenda.
Earlier, representatives of the so-called ‘troika’ — the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund — had met for just over an hour with Papademos. Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos and Labor Minister Giorgos Koutroumanis were also present.
At stake is a new 130 billion euro ($171 billion) bailout deal without which Greece will default before the end of March.
Papademos had floated the idea of the party leaders joining him in talks with troika representatives to argue the case for a different set of measures with equivalent fiscal results. Giorgos Karatzaferis, leader of the populist right Popular Orthodox Rally party refused.
“I will go (to the Prime Minister’s office) when the guests have gone,” Karatzaferis said.
It is not known how socialist leader George Papandreou — whom Papademos replaced as Prime Minister in November — and conservative leader Antonis Samaras responded. But they all arrived at Papademos’ office after the troika had left. (source: AP, DJ)
The majority of Germans feel the euro currency bloc would be better off if debt-crippled Greece left it, a poll published in mass-selling newspaper Bild am Sonntag showed on Sunday.
The Emnid poll said 53 percent of Germans surveyed thought Greece should return to its former currency, the drachma, while only 34 percent felt it should keep the euro.
Euro zone ministers had hoped to meet this coming Monday to finalise the second Greek bailout, which must be in place by mid-March to prevent a chaotic default, but the meeting was postponed because of reluctance in Athens to commit to reforms.
Without the austerity measures, which include cutting holiday bonuses and lowering the minimum wage in a country reeling from its fifth year of recession, the ministers say they cannot approve the 130 billion euro (108 billion pounds) rescue plan.
The Emnid poll said 80 percent of Germans surveyed oppose releasing the rescue package unless Greece implements the reforms. (source: Bild, Reuters)
Macedonians discovered a valuable treasure hid in the bowels of the earth, thanks to the methodical excavations undertaken in the construction of the Thessaloniki metro.
Many artifacts found in the excavation, from items such as gold hoops, benches, and thousands of everyday objects, up to whole churches, remnants of the glorious, long history of Thessaloniki, have come to light. The excavations were completed by the end of the year, leaving behind thousands of “mosaics” of cultures that flourished in the city.
Archaeologists are revealing a palimpsest of the city, a city that has undergone constant and continuous phases of occupation from the 4th century BC, when it was founded in Thessaloniki, until now! “In Byzantium, Thessalonica was described as the second city of Constantinople, precisely because of its extremely important historical position in the region.” They emphasized, among other things, that the general secretary of the Ministry of Culture, Lina Mendoni, spoke to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Economic Affairs of the House, ahead of signing an additional contract to perform archaeological work. “In terms of area stations, there are mainly archaeological investigations in the order of 17,000 sq.m. In essence, speaking of the area of excavation, we speak about 28,000 square meters, “explained Ms. Mendoni.
Roman Era
Continuing the narration of the general secretary of the Ministry of Culture, he said that the thriving city of Thessaloniki, especially in the Roman period and Byzantine times, as revealed by the excavations of the subway, were much like today’s Egnatia Street, both sides filled with dense structures.
“I remind you that you may know from the novels the Avenue of the Byzantines. It is the old Egnatia, the Roman Egnatia, as revealed, that the marble paved road running through the city exactly where the metro passes. I want to say that especially the Byzantine Thessaloniki, unlike other modern eras for the cities of medieval Europe, has a drainage system that exists in no other medieval city. A large part of the culture of a city is evident in where its trash and waste ends up. This indicates the developed level of Byzantine Thessaloniki with a unique drainage system, which is revealed, “said Mr. Mendoni.
Thousands of Findings
From the subway stations where the excavations are evolving in two key areas, Saint Sophia and Venizelos, located in the historic city center, the excavation has been completed to the level of the Byzantine period, and now begin excavations in deeper layers. They have already discovered about 2,500 square meters of ancient buildings!
Not only the buildings, but also major crops and finds should be preserved. The finds now number over 28,225, and among them are some 5,000 vessels, over 5,000 glass finds, over 1,500 pieces of jewelry, more than 130 signs, and more than 400 figurines. Among those eight golden crowns are wreaths from the excavations in Vergina and Goats.
Postings
Reference was made to posting the monuments. “There are sites that cannot be lost, to disappear. Therefore, following the provisions of the archaeological law and the public interest, because there are all those documentations required for historical and archaeological research, these monuments will be posted, and a large proportion of these will grace their stations when formulated in Thessaloniki”, said the general secretary of the Ministry of Culture, while referring to the cost required for the maintenance and storage of thousands of finds, which is expected to rise to unfathomable heights.
“Suffice it to say that the Baths of Phoenix, a monument which stood in areas of maintenance, cost about 200,000 euros, and that the rent of some stores is incurred in the cost of archaeological investigations in Kalochori, a very large area, because otherwise they cannot complete the required tasks, while costing about 3,000 euros a month in rent. “
The Money
Earlier, the president of “Metro SA”, Chris Tsitouras, spoke and said the Thessaloniki metro in the past faced many problems, most notably archaeology.
“The basic agreement here is the long-slide provided only 15 million euros for archaeological excavations, when today with an official document from the Ministry of Culture, the final amount is an estimate very close to reality – close to 90 million euros. He had planned to be around 20 months, and the archaeological excavations would finish in late 2009; it is possible to deliver a project and need three years after completion of archaeological excavations, with a planned finish date of around 2012. Imagine the end of 2009, when all excavations should have finished, the year closed with only 11.5% completed, and 19 million euros spent. The slippage of three or four years had just about ended the archaeological excavations, and other issues such as expropriation, technical, etc. To be very precise, archaeology and its problems in the city center, which represents 23 centuries of continuous history – it brought the trend, “said Mr. Tsitouras.
He said that the 15 million forecast in the original contract had already been spent by July 2009. “So then used money from the contingency of the project is 81 million euros. To date we have spent 48 million for archaeological work. Because of unforeseen work that has delayed the end of the project, in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture, whereas the final cost was estimated at around 90 million – which the managing authority (paying authority) agreed upon – they have now said that there must be a new contract with a new item. For this reason we were led to this additional, supplemental contract,” said Mr. Tsitouras.
(Stories that were not included in the “History of Cretans in Oceania”)
From Athens, in 1981, Gabrielle Lord rang the telephone exchange in Chania searching for a distant relative, a great uncle, who must have been in his nineties by then, who knew her great – grandfather, Constantine Koukousakis, that had arrived in Australia on board the British steam ship Galatea in 1866.
She hoped that her sole surviving relative still lived in the village of Tsikalaria in the Kissamos district of Crete. The operator at the telephone exchange in Chania seemed to know her great uncle because, he replied: “Kaput, kaput 40 days”, indicating that he had died 40 days earlier.
Despite her disappointment, because she had not managed to see her great uncle, she decided to visit and see for herself her great grandfather’s village.
From Chania she takes a taxi for Tsikalaria. The curious taxi driver, with broken English, asked her why she was visiting Tsikalaria and she explained to him that her great grandfather was Constantine Koukousakis from that village. Koukousakis you said? He stopped the car suddenly at the side of the road and with great joy he said: “Kiss me, we are cousins! My mother was a Koukousakis before she married.” Truly, quite a coincidence! Only a mountain cannot meet another mountain, as the Greek saying goes.
At Tsikalaria there was a great reception and a feast was laid out in her honour.
Gabrielle, who lives in Sydney today, is a writer of some 14 novels. 25 years later, she visited Crete again. She was planning to write a novel, to be titled “the Woman Who Loved God”. It was to be about an Australian painter who came to Crete and lived in a village house that she had inherited from her grandmother.
Gabrielle had chosen Crete not only because of her roots but also because she wanted to combine the wilderness of the nature and the ancient monuments with a story of love for painting, about a woman disinterested in men but only interested in art, painting the sea, the god Poseidon, ancient temples, Byzantine churches, synagogues, icons, altars, and many other such things. She wanted to write while living in Crete, the island of her great grandfather, to gather all that information that was needed to make her novel alive.
Finally she didn’t manage to write this novel as she had to start writing a series of 12 novels that currently are being made into a television serial. She deferred writing her novel for 2010 when she was to return to Kasteli again.
I read about all these things in an article, in the newspaper The Australian a few weeks ago, and this prompted me to get in touch with her to search together with her for the great grandfather, Constatine Koukousakis, whom I had not come across during my research for my book, “The history of Cretans in Oceania from the 19th century”. How did this happen?
The first Greeks that came to Australia were prone to change their surnames, to Anglicise them, by changing their ending, to avoid the racial discrimination and deportation for those that were illegal. This unfortunately was quite prevalent those days. So her great grandfather from Koukousakis became Kookoosachi, Koosachi, Koosache.
Constantine in 1928
Following extensive research in the Australian National Archives I established that Constantine Koukousakis left during the Turkish occupation, long suffering due to its many insurrections from Crete to Kythera, which during that period was an English protectorate . He worked initially on some British Navy steam ships and in 1866 arrived in Australia with the steam ship “Galatea”.
His great granddaughter, Gabrielle Lord, says that according to family tradition he initially went to Bendigo, in the state of Victoria, searching for gold. Unfortunately I was unable to find information supporting this view.
It is quite likely though, because in that area gold had been discovered in 1851 and hundreds of gold prospectors were searching for gold, amongst them also some Greeks. It is possible that he left the steam ship “Galatea” in Melbourne and from there went to Bendigo where he met other Greeks to search for gold.
Two years later we find him travelling on board the steam ship “Alexandria” from Maryborough of Queensland to Sydney on 24.8.1868 and a month later on 19.9.1868 working as a third cook on steam ship Wonga Wonga travelling from Melbourne to Sydney.
Constantine Kookoosachi family about the end of 19th century
He stayed in Sydney from there on permanently and he worked as a cook at the “Australian Hotel” for a few years, according to family tradition. In 1873 he married an English woman, Elizabeth Ellen Binks, at the suburb of Waterloo in Sydney at a Catholic church, with whom he had 13 children. They were Ernest (1874-1945), Elizabeth (1876-1943), Thomas (1878-1944), Marigo (1880-1881), the twins Ethel and Blanche (1881-1882), Greta (1884-1950), George (1886-1889), Percy (1890-1966), Harold (1893- ?), James (1895-1956), William (1897-1897) and John (1899-1989) .
It should not be seen as strange that he married in a Catholic church, as during that period there were no Orthodox churches in Australia and the requirements of Orthodox people were being taken care of by Anglican, and in some cases, Catholic churches. From the dates above we can also see that some of the children died at a very early age. Quite a few survived though and today his descendants live in many areas of Australia and New Zealand.
One of his children was Percy Kookoosachi, who fought as volunteer during the First World War in Gallipoli in 1915 and in France in 1918. On September 18, 1918, the Australian 13th battalion, with which he was serving, took part in its last offensive action in France, this time around Le Verguier, in the Somme, where Percy Kookoosachi was wounded . He was awarded three war medals, one for his service in Gallipoli and two in France. He returned to Australia early in 1919.
Other Greek volunteers who fought in this war were Jack Marck, John Zavitsanos, Kostas Aronis, Robert Krokos, Atha Halkas, Leonidas Manousou, Nikos Rodakis, George Papas, Minas Alsanis, Anastasios Rembea, Peter Randos, who was killed, also the Cretans George Cretan (Bikouvarakis) who was wounded and also received three war medals, Joseph Voyatzis, and many others. (see Socrates Tsourdalakis’ book ‘‘ The Cretans of Oceania from the 19th century’’.
In October of 1876, Constantine Koukousakis was awarded British (Australian) citizenship and from then on he lived and worked in the Sydney suburb of Merrylands until 1934 when he died at the age of 85. He was buried at the Rookwood cemetery.
According to the obituary in the Sydney Morning Herald of 30.3.1934 he was one of the founders of the Granville Catholic Church. He was survived by 8 of his children
In 1951 his wife Elizabeth also died and was buried with her husband Constantine.
The grave headstone of Constantine Kookoosachi & wife Elizabeth (Photo courtesy June Bullivant)
Eurogroup head Jean-Claude Juncker told Germany’s Spiegel magazine in an interview pre-released on Saturday that help for Greece won’t be coming at any cost and explicitly threatened the country with bankruptcy if it doesn’t get its act together.
He said, should Greece fail to implement necessary reforms, then it should not expect acts of solidarity “to be rendered by others.” He goes on, “if we should determine that everything is going wrong in Greece, then there would not be a new program, then that would mean that in March a declaration of bankruptcy would occur.”
The mere possibility that such a thing could happen should give the Greeks muscle to follow through on areas where there is paralysis at the moment. Juncker reportedly says that planned privatization of state firms remains clearly behind agreements. “Greece needs to know that we will not let up on the topic of privatization.” (source: Dow Jones, Spiegel)
Greece has one day left to clinch a eurozone bailout and a bond swap with creditors to manage its crushing debt repayments, the finance minister said Saturday, warning that talks were “on a knife edge.”
“The moment is very critical,” Evangelos Venizelos told reporters, after a telephone conference with fellow eurozone finance ministers, which he described as “very difficult.”.
“Everything must be concluded by tomorrow night… so that we can be within the timetable given the bond maturities in March,” the minister said.
“We are on a knife edge.”
Athens has been negotiating with the European Union, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank on further action needed to unlock a new rescue deal worth 130 billion euros ($171 billion). Pressure is also mounting for a deal with private lenders to wipe out part of the 350-billion-euro Greek debt, with Athens facing imminent loan repayments of 14.4 billion euros ($19 billion) on March 20.
Venizelos said two major points of contention with the EU and IMF remained open — controversial labour cost cuts, and new fiscal measures to address slippage to deficit targets owing to a greater-than-forecast recession.
He said the time had come for the coalition of socialist, conservative and far-right parties backing the Greek interim government to make “a decision and a commitment” to pave the way for an agreement. (source: AFP)
Over 10 tons of potatoes were distributed in Nevrokopi to residents, a gift from potato growers from Drama, who arrived early Saturday morning at Thessaloniki International Exhibition Centre, carrying out the 24th Agrotica.Despite the bitter cold and drizzle, the inhabitants of Thessaloniki rushed to get sacks of potatoes, which were carried on foot or by bicycle.The potato growers gave 1,700 packs of six pounds to the citizens, while 300 exakiles (6-kilo) packages supplied the community grocery store in Thessaloniki.
The producer of potatoes, Nikos Stefanidis, said that with this move, the potatoes will benefit many families, which is very important during these difficult days we are experiencing. Also, he stated that this will test the inhabitants’ reaction to their product, and hopefully they will build some customer loyalty.
This action follows complain about potato growers about low prices, since potato merchants can purchase product from the growers at almost half the cost of production. In addition, growers report that 70% of their production remains unsold, while potatoes are imported into Greece from Egypt.
Sunday Herald Sun reporter Hamish Heard has revealed that a $20 million lawsuit has been filed by the false rape accuser of former Victorian cabinet minister Theo Theophanous.
Macedonians discovered a valuable treasure hid in the bowels of the earth, thanks to the methodical excavations undertaken in the construction of the Thessaloniki metro.
