Athens News Agency: News in English, 10-08-16

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

CONTENTS

[01] Junta ringleader Ioannidis dies

[02] Samaria Gorge robbery

[03] Wildfires under control

[01] Junta ringleader Ioannidis dies

Ioannidis was hospitalised at a Piraeus-area hospital after being transferred from the nearby Korydallos penitentiary, where he was serving a life sentence.

Throughout his 35-year incarceration Ioannidis had refused to request clemency.

During the military junta (1967-1974), Ioannidis served as chief of the dreaded Greek military police (ESA). In November 1973, after a student uprising at the Athens Polytechnic, Ioannidis, by then a brigadier general, toppled dictator and coup co-conspirator Georgios Papadopoulos.

Ioannidis' even harsher dictatorship engineered the coup d'etat in Cyprus to remove Archbishop Makarios, thereby serving as a long-sought pretext by the Turkish military to invade the island republic in July 1974.

[02] Samaria Gorge robbery

According to reports, three masked suspects with shotguns roughed up an employee at the entrance of the famous gorge at the Xyloskalo site. Afterwards they tied the man's hands and took his mobile phone, radio receivers and the keys of the safebox.

[03] Wildfires under control

Meanwhile, a wildfire in a forested area in Thesprotia prefecture (NW Greece) was partially contained.

Fires on Zakynthos and Lassithi prefecture, Crete , are reportedly under control.

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