Athens News Agency: News in English (PM), 98-03-30

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

NEWS IN ENGLISH

Athens, Greece, 30/03/1998 (ANA)

MAIN HEADLINES

• SE European youth ministers meet
• Flood compensation approved
• Greek,Turkish scientists cooperate on public health
• Cyprus starts membership talks with EU today
• Greek and Albanian defence ministers meet in Ioannina
• Premier to chair KYSEA meeting today
• Papoulias heads parliamentary delegation to Tirana
• Weather
• Foreign Exchange

NEWS IN DETAIL

Education Minister Gerassimos Arsenis on Monday stressed the need to gear specific initiatives and actions to the needs of youth, while opening the sessions of the 1st Ministerial Conference of Southeast European Countries on Youth Issues in Athens.

"In investing in the future, we invest in the young people," he said. "We must offer them developmental experiences so that they will become active citizens of society, more opportunities so that they can try and be tried. The young people must feel they are citizens of the universe. The global village is here, and we cannot shut our eyes."

Similar meetings on youth issues will be held in late April in Bucharest (Council of Europe ministers), and in August in Lisbon (1st world conference).

Balkan countries' non-governmental youth organisations began meeting in Athens yesterday to coordinate policies for the youth in these countries.

Delegates from Albania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Montenegro, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM), Romania, and Greece met and discussed issues ranging form education and minority rights to equal opportunities and human rights in the region. Turkish non-governmental organisations were invited as well, but did not attend. Bosnia-Herzegovina is also absent.

The youth conference ended today, with participants stressing the need to formalise cooperation between them and to organise meetings along with the wider public and governments of Balkan countries to highlight issues affecting youth.

The conclusions of the youth conference were handed over to the ministerial conference for their consideration in the issuing of a joint communique later tonight.

The conclusions include a restatement of the right to education, health and equal opportunity and called for better education and vocational training to offset rising unemployment among youth.

Flood compensation approved

Environment, Town Planning and Public Works Minister Costas Laliotis said Monday that people who suffered damages from last week's storms and floods would initially receive 200,000 dr. in compensation, while compensation of up to 2 million dr. for wrecked household appliances would also be forthcoming.

He also said businesses suffering damages would be subsidised for one third of the damage and would receive loans under auspicious terms to meet the balance, while the same measure would also apply for homes that suffered substantial damage.

Sources said that Mr. Laliotis has also ordered the Western Attica prefectural office to speed up procedures for the expropriation of land required to carry out anti-flooding works and, if problems arose, to go ahead with requisition of the land.

Greek,Turkish scientists cooperate on public health

A two-day meeting beginning in Nafplio on Thursday will provide the opportunity for Greek and Turkish scientists to discuss and cooperate on public health problems associated with the movement of populations.

Representatives of Greek and Turkish scientific organisations will be taking part in the meeting, which will focus on the problem of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases with respect to the movement of migrants, tourists and so-called "special" groups such as gypsies.

The initiative for the meeting belongs to Welfare Undersecretary Theodoros Kotsonis.

"Populations on the move sometimes belong to disadvantaged groups which often face more acute or particular health problems which they either had before or acquired after their movement. These problems must be dealt with in the most effective manner, as too must the repercussions of the movement of such populations on public health," Kotsonis told a press conference today.

Kotsonis also stressed the need for cooperation between all the countries of the European Union and also of the Balkans, where the movement of populations is particularly marked.

Cyprus starts membership talks with EU today

The European Union must not be deterred by Turkish intransigence or U.S. concern from proceeding with membership negotiations with the divided island of Cyprus, Greek Cypriot Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides said on Sunday.

Speaking in Brussels on the eve of official membership talks with the EU, Kasoulides said the Union's open door to Cyprus presented a unique opportunity to motivate Greek Cypriots and their ethnic Turkish rivals to resolve their long feud.

"Don't destroy this leverage by saying only if you unite (the island) can you enter Europe," Kasoulides said. This would be tantamount to giving Turkey a veto over the island's future.

"The only leverage comes from the EU," he added.

After meeting United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan in Geneva on Saturday, Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash said talks on unifying Cyprus were dead unless negotiations to take the island into the European Union were delayed.

In terms of its economy and democratic institutions, Cyprus is favoured to enter the wealthy EU in the next wave of "enlargement", perhaps in 2002.

The Greek and Turkish communities have been separated by U.N. peacekeepers since 1974 when Turkey invaded the northern third of Cyprus in response to a Greek Cypriot coup to unite the island with Greece.

The Turkish Cypriots, 17 percent of the island's population, declared independence in 1983. Only Turkey recognizes them. The Greek Cypriot government is internationally recognised and has support from EU-member Greece for its membership bid.

Greek and Albanian defence ministers meet in Ioannina

"Greece has never been, nor will ever become, a country of racist attitudes and racist phenomena," National Defence Minister Akis Tsohatzopoulos said in the northern Greek town of Ioannina yesterday, after talks with visiting Albanian counterpart Sabit Brokaj.

The Albanian defence minister told reporters that "some isolated incidents do not threaten the friendly relations" between the two neighbouring countries.

The ministers' talks focussed on a Greek proposal for the establishment of a multinational peacekeeping force in the Balkans.

The proposal had been discussed in Sophia in October at a meeting of Balkan defence undersecretaries.

Mr. Tsohatzopoulos agreed to an Albanian proposal that the Balkan undersecretaries meet again in Tirana on May 21.

The two ministers also discussed recent developments in Yugoslavia's strife- torn Kosovo region.

Mr. Tsohatzopoulos said that the Greek government firmly opposed armed violence in the region, while at the same time it endorsed respect of human rights, which he said could be achieved only through dialogue among the sides involved.

Mr. Brokaj referred to the meeting of Southeast European leaders hosted on the Greek island of Crete last November, which he described as a "historic" event which, however, "Europe did not take appropriate advantage of in order to avert the bloody events in Kosovo".

He said the Crete meeting "should have been followed up by other meetings among Tirana, Kosovo and Belgrade, but it was not".

Premier to chair KYSEA meeting today

Prime Minister Costas Simitis will preside today at the meeting of the Government Council for Foreign Affairs and Defence (KYSEA), in efforts to decide the future arms aquisition programme.

The council is expected to decide on anti-aircraft arms for the protection of the country and specifically for the islands as well as the new type of warplane to be purchased by the government.

Defence Minister Akis Tsohatzopoulos noted that the issues of civil defence and the creation of a national arms purchase fund will also be discussed.

Papoulias heads parliamentary delegation to Tirana

A delegation of the Greek Parliament Foreign and Defence Affairs Committee, led by former foreign minister Carolos Papoulias, arrived here yesterday at the invitation of the corresponding Albanian committee.

The delegation will be informed on the current political situation in the country as well as the course of Greek-Albanian relations.

The delegation met with Archbishop of Tirana and all of Albania Anastasios while today they are to meet with Albanian President Rexhep Mejdani, Prime Minister Fatos Nano and former Albanian president and Democratic Party leader Sali Berisha among others .

The delegates will visit the Greek military force in Albania, and also hold talks with their Albanian counterparts and representatives of the Greek minority.

The visit is within the framework of contacts between the parliaments of the two countries. The visit will coincide with the tabling of a bill in the Albanian parliament for a six-month extension of the Greek military forces' stay in the neighbouring co untry aimed at contributing in efforts to restructure the Albanian military.

WEATHER

FOREIGN EXCHANGE

(M.P.)

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