The Greek police’s electronics crime squad has averted 67 suicides that had been pre-announced in Internet chat rooms since the beginning of the year, a police announcement said on Wednesday.
Police said the people were aged 13 to 48, and some of them, mainly minors, had taken pills immediately after announcing their intentions on the internet, but were saved because police ‘hackers’ managed to trace them quickly.
Police said that one surprising motive behind several of the intended suicides among both minors and adults were on-line games. After being blocked from games by the central administrator after violating the rules of the game, some of the intended suicides had stated on the web that they would take their lives if they were not immediately reinstated in the game.
A police announcement also said that other Internet users, including a priest, had been instrumental in spotting intended suicides and alerting the electronic crimes squad of such messages they had seen.
In fact he announcement added, the electronics crime division had received a call from the priest about 10 days ago that, during an ‘online confession’ via Skype, the man who was “confessing” had expressed his intention to commit suicide due to personal problems, which was confirmed by a digital investigation.
In every instance, the assistance of psychologists was sought to deal with the incidents, police said.
(source: ana-mpa)

The Council of State has considered the Memorandum constitutional, dismissing the appeal that had been lodged by the GSEE, ADEDY and other institutions. The Council of State also noted by its decision, that the memorandum does not violate the Constitution, the European Convention of Human Rights and the international conventions.
Moreover, the judges found that the provisions of the Memorandum are not against, as claimed by the DPS, ADEDY, the Articles of the Constitution such as Article 2 on the protection of human dignity, Article 4 on the principle of equality, Article 17 on the protection of property,which includes the concept of salary, Article 25 concerning the principle of proportionality and Article 28 which states that international treaties are ratified by a majority of 180 members.
Furthermore, Senior Judges decided that the disputed law did not need to be voted by a qualified majority in parliament (180 MPs), as it is not an international convention. The Plenary Council of State also acknowledged that the memorandum does not restrict in any way the exercise of sovereignty of the country, as our national sovereignty is not restricted by our accession to the International Monetary Fund.
Having said that, all appeals were dismissed.

More than 400 people, including representatives of the Greek and foreign governments, entities of the industrial development and the Minister of the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, have participated in the “Sea Tourism Forum” conference so far. The Posidonia Sea Tourism Forum began on Monday, the 21st of June and continues on until Tuesday, the 22nd of June.
The Minister of the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, announced at the beginning of the forum, “cruise is a key issue of the whole policy that affects tourism….Improvement of the sea tourism has already been made and the Mediterranean Sea could be the centre of our economy, but this action demands investments.”
Most of the speakers stressed the fact that the Mediterranean and Black Sea play a significant role to our economy and they requested cruise companies to schedule more trips in the area.
The ECC Pierfrancesco Vago and the CEO of MSC Cruises pointed out that they need a stable policy and an effective program. They welcomed the flexibility of the law, because in their point of view, cruises have to be flexible in order to satisfy the demands of their clients.
Another big issue is the infrastructure of Greece. The nation is the only one which has a problem with port capacity. Ships are competitive to each other, because the docking problem does not leave them any other option. The ship which arrives first has the opportunity to dock, the others have to wait their turn.

A rally was organised by the Members of the Association of Visual Arts, on Wednesday morning. The artists who gathered at the Acropolis Museum, then headed towards the Ministry of Culture in Exarchia, protesting against the tactics of the government.  They believe the government is not  protecting their profession at such a critical period of time.  Many actors and artists stay jobless without any financial security in their lives. The protesters walked towards the Ministry along Amalia Avenue, Patision Avenue and Bouboulina Street.