Athens News Agency: News in English, 05-10-20

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

CONTENTS

[01] Development minister inaugurates Mediterranean Cosmos mall in Thessaloniki

[02] Lowest unleaded price in Europe

[03] New tourism training strategy

[04] PASOK leader hosts Arab envoys

[05] Gov't adamant against corruption

[01] Development minister inaugurates Mediterranean Cosmos mall in Thessaloniki

Speaking during the event, Sioufas referred to the importance of the project for the development of Thessaloniki and the wider region, stressing that it constitutes the focal point for investments that will follow. He praised the effort made by the businessmen participating in Mediterranean Cosmos and called on them to keep prices at a low level.

The minister also said that the new mall constitutes supplementary activity for the city, which will develop into a centre of developments in the region of southeastern Europe.

The Mediterranean Cosmos belongs to the companies LAMDA Development (60.1 percent) and Sierra-Charagionis (39.9 percent) and will operate 214 shops which include 37 restaurants and coffee houses, a cinema (11 screens), a supermarket and other shops, while 2,600 parking spaces will also be available.

[02] Lowest unleaded price in Europe

According to the data (sample of September 14, 2005 in all the countries, with the average price of crude oil at 62 dollars per barrel), Greece again maintained in September the lowest price of unleaded with an average price of 1.02 euros per litre against 0.93 euros per litre in August 2005.

Greece also maintained the third lowest price in diesel with 0.99 euros per litre in September against 0.92 euros in August, against 0.90 Euro in Luxembourg and 0.98 euros in Spain.

In the price of unleaded, Greece was followed by Spain, Luxembourg, Ireland and Austria while the highest price was in Finland, Belgium and The Netherlands.

[03] New tourism training strategy

Liaskos said that tourism training is being upgraded with the establishment of a University Tourist Faculty, following a decision taken by the Inner Cabinet. In parallel, a committee has been created at the ministry on modernising the tourist education and training framework.

In another development, Liaskos had a meeting with the members of the Athens Archdiocese, who are participating in the Committee on Religious and Pilgrim Tourism, which has been created in the framework of a ministerial decision to develop a relevant tourist sector.

The meeting was held after the first regular meeting of the committee's members at the ministry on Wednesday.

Liaskos was briefed by the delegation's head Archimandrite Spyridon Katramados on the outcome of the meeting, while the issue of the participation of the Greek delegation in events organised by the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Alexiy in the Russian capital in November was also discussed.

[04] PASOK leader hosts Arab envoys

During the dinner, the discussion centred on developments in the Middle East and on Euro-Mediterranean cooperation, which this year marks the 10th anniversary since its initiation in Barcelona.

Addressing the Arab ambassadors, Papandreou stressed the importance of friendship and cooperation for the Mediterranean region, and noted the efforts in that direction made by his father, the late PASOK founder and former prime minister Andreas Papandreou, by current Greek President of the Republic Karolos Papoulias, who served as foreign minister under the Andreas Papandreou governments in the 1980s, and also to his own efforts, as foreign minister under the preceding PASOK government of Costas Simitis, which culminated during the Greek presidency of the EU in the first half of 2003.

Papandreou said that the fundamental issues of the region were development and security while, on the Palestinian issue, he placed particular importance on implementation of the Road Map in order to attain a solution and an independent Palestinian state.

Dean of the Arab Diplomatic Corps of Greece and Ambassador of Lebanon William Habib, who has many years of service in the post in Greece, said that the best cooperation between Greece and the Arab countries had developed during Papandreou's tenure in the foreign minister, attributing this to the traditional good relations between the Papandreou family and the Arab world.

The dinner was attended by the Ambassadors of Lebanon, Morocco, Syria, Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Egypt, Kuweit, Tunisia, Palestine, Saudi Arabia and Libya.

On the part of PASOK, the dinner was attended by the party's coordinator on foreign affairs and defence issues Michalis Chrysohoidis, and the director of Papandreou's diplomatic office Dimitris Droutsas.

[05] Gov't adamant against corruption

The three-day conference is hosted by the National Centre for Public Administration and Local Administration in cooperation with the European Anti-Fraud Office.

In pointing to results from the government's efforts so far, Pavlopoulos noted that a recent report by the NGO Transparency International refers to a "clear improvement" in terms of Greece's "corruption index", something he said overturns the trend over recent years in the country.

Besides Greek public administration officials, EU member-states' representatives as well as officials from EU candidate-states (Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey) and other Balkan countries (Albania, FYROM and Serbia-Montenegro) are also attending the conference.

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