All Flights to and from all Greek airports will be normally conducted on Wednesday, as the Union of Air Traffic Controllers decided today to give an end to the mobilisations that would take place on Wednesday’s 24-hour nationwide general strike called by the country’s two biggest trade union bodies GSEE (General Confederation of Greek Workers) and ADEDY (Civil Servants’ Confederation).
On the other hand, public transport employees will be staging work stoppages at the beginning of the morning shifts and at the end of the night shifts, during Wednesday’s 24-hour nationwide general labour strike. This will facilitate the public in commuting and taking part in the demonstrations.
Commuter buses will run from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m., the Athens Metro from 8:00 a.m. to the end of the night shift, the ISAP trains from 8:00 a.m. to 9L00 p.m., trolleys from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m., and trams from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.
Hellenic Rail (OSE) and Proastiakos suburban rail will not be running on Wednesday.
The Athens Metro will be operating on Wednesday only to Doukissis Plakentias station, and will not transfer passengers on the section to and from Athens International Airport, as that section belongs to the jurisdiction of OSE, whose employees are striking for the whole day.
Flights will normally run – Public Transport Will Work with Stoppages on Wednesday, in Athens
Public Power Corporation: A series of rolling 48-hour strikes
As of the following Monday, June 20, the Public Power Corporation (PPC) staff union GENOP is scheduled to begin a series of rolling 48-hour strikes protesting against the further privatization of the power utility. The strike is expected to have an impact on power supply throughout the country and may lead to scheduled rotating power cuts.
S&P Downgrades Greece
Standard & Poor’s slashed its ratings on Greece three notches, making it the firm’s lowest-rated government debt in the world, citing its belief of a higher likelihood of one or more defaults over the next 12 months.
Greece said a decision by Standard & Poor’s to further downgrade the country’s sovereign debt is based on rumors of a default and doesn’t take into account current talks for a second bailout by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund, and the government’s efforts to bring its debt under control.
“In our view, any such transactions would likely be on terms less favorable than the debt being refinanced, which we, in turn, would view as a de facto default according to Standard & Poor’s published criteria,” the agency said.
The downgrade comes at a particularly awkward time for Greece. The government is attempting to persuade legislators to accept a fresh set of austerity measures. At the same time, Germany, the dominant economy in the 17-member euro zone, is proposing that private sector bond holders accept some form of a loss on their Greek bonds as a condition for a broader rescue package for Greece that could approach 100 billion euros.
Greek markets were closed Monday for a holiday.
On June, 15 the Proposals for the New Education Reforms
A new plan and proposals about the tertiary educational reforms will officially be presented by Anna Diamantopoulou, Education Minister, on June 15. The reforms will be applied in both university (AEI) and technical college (TEI) education systems.
Among the provisions included in the draft law are the closing down and the merger of entire colleges and university departments. There are colleges
Tension High within Eurogroup as Greece Requires More Aid
A special Eurogroup meeting scheduled for tomorrow will feature Finance Ministers from the euro-zone. They will discuss the tense situation concerning modalities, timeline and figures of the second aid plan to Greece.
No one can deny any longer that an additional bailout plan is needed to save Greece from insolvency, which would have a disastrous chain effect on Europe and put world financial stability at risk. What is disagreed upon is not if, but how to intervene. Germany wants private entities, meaning banks, to be required to do their part. German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble has proposed extending Greek bonds by seven years, while his Belgian counterpart Didier Reynders yesterday put the contribution of private bodies at 25 billion euros out of an estimated total of 80 billion euros.
The figures are very likely but have yet to be confirmed, especially the part which could come ”in a friendly manner” from banks, pension funds and insurance companies. The ECB has warned against the risks connected with involving private bodies, which is why it has requested that specific restrictions be laid down. ”The participation,” said Jurgen Stark, member of the executive committee, ”must be entirely voluntary and not translate into failure.” ECB chairman Jean-Claude Trichet will insist on this concept on Tuesday within the Eurogroup, while the candidate to take his place, Governor Mario Draghi, will hold his first public hearing before the European Parliament a few hundred metres from the Council’s offices. Over the past few hours the German proposal has gained approval.
The European Commission did not reject it out of hand since – according to the spokesman for EU economic affairs commissioner Olli Rehn – the involvement occurs on a ”voluntary” basis, on the model of what happened in the past for Eastern European countries having problems with the so-called ”Vienna Agreement”. What Brussels considers important is that the operation will not be seen by the markets as a default. Even Eurogroup chairman Jean-Claude Juncker is not against the German solution so long as it doesn’t enter a sort of collision course with the ECB.
Juncker said that Greece needs ”a ‘soft’, voluntary debt restructuring”. Others prefer to call it a ”rollover”: an operation which makes it possible to extend an existing financial commitment which has already come to term. The latter are simply semantic subtleties which clash with the inflexibility of rating agencies. If they were to label a specific operation as ”a default event”, there would be no bailout plan that could come to the rescue. And the outlook for a disastrous domino effect on the weakest economies of the euro-zone, Portugal and Ireland first and foremost, would become a tragic reality.
"I Do NOT Pay" Movement Protests Tolls at Rio-Antirio Bridge Today
Today is a mass return to Athens, because of the Holy Spirit day and the movement ‘I Do NOT Pay’ is organizing actions against the toll charge at the Rio-Antirio bridge. The members of the movement are calling all citizens to participate in this action by urging them to make a 10 minute rest at the tolls, in order to assert their position.
The movement in cooperation with the Popular Assembly of Square, are raising the barriers at the National Road Athens- Patras.
Nia Vardalos Apologizes to Gay Community Regarding Tracy Morgan’s Comments
This month during a standup performance, Tracy Morgan made inflammatory comments about homosexuals. In his statements he declared that if his son were gay, he would pull out a knife and stab him. Then, Morgan apologized and admitted having gone too far.
My ‘Big Greek Fat Wedding’ star Nia Vardalos apologized for Tracy Morgan’s anti-gay statements, in an essay penned for the Huffington Post.
”I would like to apologize to our entire gay and lesbian community that this hate still exists”, she wrote and added, “I’m sorry someone can stand on a stage, spew violent, hateful words and images, then issue an apology, be described as not-really-like-that by his employers and co-workers, and go back to work”.
Nevertheless, she feels optimistic that this hate will soon end and that the gay and lesbian community will be more accepted in the near future. Vardalos apologized for Morgan’s tough behavior against homosexual people and hopes that Morgan’s apology will be accepted.
Constantina Amanatidis Awarded with “Medal of the Order of Australia”
At the age of 73, the Glen Waverley Constantina Amanatidis was awarded with a ”Medal of the Order of Australia” (OAM) for her services to Australia’s Greek community through contributions to multicultural organisations and for her publications.
She settled in Melbourne in 1958, and has devoted her life to writing books about immigrants, mainly focusing on personal stories by others. This helped her adapt to the new Australian environment more easily when first arriving in Melbourne. She soon became passionate about listening to other immigrants’ experiences and that’s how she battled her lonely feelings, at the beginning of her stay in her new country.
Apart from her rich literary career, she has always been a big supporter of the Greek community’s artistic efforts. Additionally she is a founding member of the Greek-Australian Cultural League of Melbourne and the Multicultural Writers Association of Victoria.
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Darwin’s Greek Glenti Festival Sells Over 3 Tons of Octopus
The 23rd Annual Greek Glenti Festival was held yesterday afternoon, at the historic Bicentennial Park in Darwin. It was a vibrant festival where the Greek community shared their culture with locals and visitors.
About 40,ooo people attended the special event. ”The biggest Saturday night we have ever seen at Glenti”, said MC Evan Papandonakis.
Three tons of barbecued octupus were sold during the event! Participants had the opportunity to taste delicious Greek dishes, listen to Greek music and watch people dance to traditional Greek music.
The money collected in the fundraising event will go to the Menzies School of Health Research. The Greek Orthodox Community of North Australia runs this event annually, and this year the festival’s aim is to give financial aid to the Menzies School.
Three Greek Sisters & The Flavours of Greece
The Hellenic-Canadian Board of Trade (HCBT) is holding an extraordinary summer event on Thursday, June 23, at the Palais Royale Ballroom. The special culinary event will feature local celebrity chefs, the ‘Three Greek Sisters’ and their authentic Greek cuisine.
The three talented chefs, Betty, Eleni and Samantha Bakopolous will be offering visitors the opportunity to experience a delicious Greek menu with recipes all ‘flavours of Greece’. Also, as part of the event, Kolonaki Group, who have been representing Europe’s finest beverages since 1999, will provide elegant Greek wines from the acclaimed Mediterra Winery on Crete for pairings and tasting.
The event which will start at 6:00pm, will take place on the outdoor patio of the Palias Royale overlooking Lake Ontario, an excellent location for food and wine lovers to enjoy their delectable food.
The Three Greek sisters, whose parents emigrated to Canada from the Peloponnesus region of Greece are also authors of an award-winning and national bestseller cookbook, ‘Three sisters Around the Greek Table’. The idea for the book came about when Samantha realized it was something that was missing from her kitchen shelf; a cookery book full of simple but tasty Greek food. Despite the sisters living in three different Ontario cities, they managed to write and photograph 150 Greek recipes in a year and produce a very remarkable cookbook.
Everyone is welcome to the “Flavors of Greece” event. For more details: http://hcbt.com/Default.aspx?pageId=800430&eventId=332219&EventViewMode=EventDetails
Registration: HCBT Member – $40.00 (CAD) or Non-HCBT Member – $50.00 (CAD)