Hundreds more feared missing from overcrowded fishing vessel that reportedly sailed from Libya for Italy
At least 78 people have died and hundreds more are feared missing in the deadliest refugee shipwreck off Greece this year.
The victims, nearly all of them men from Afghanistan and Pakistan, drowned when the large trawler they were travelling in capsized off the southern Peloponnese.
Continue reading...Babis Anagnostopoulos received a 27-year sentence for smothering his wife in Athens
The Greek pilot who killed his British wife, Caroline Crouch, in a crime he tried to pin on ruthless foreign robbers, has unexpectedly announced he will drop an appeal to overturn his life sentence.
Babis Anagnostopoulos said he had elected “for extremely serious reasons” to put a stop to appeals court proceedings under way since May, without further explanation.
Continue reading...Scott Seddon, 26, from Liverpool was being filmed by his partner as the tragedy happened off coast of Rhodes
The partner of a British tourist who died when he was struck by lightning while paddleboarding off Rhodes had beseeched him to return to shore when the storm hit.
Scott Seddon’s girlfriend repeatedly shouted “come out” when it became clear the 26-year-old from Liverpool was struggling in the waters off Agathi beach. The woman, who has not been named, was on land filming Seddon, an accomplished sportsman, with her mobile phone as the tragedy unfolded.
Continue reading...Local media say man, 26, was being filmed in sea off Agia Agathi beach in Rhodes when lightning struck water nearby
An investigation has been launched into the death of a British man who was reportedly struck by lightning while paddleboarding in Greece.
The unnamed man was in the sea off the beach in Agia Agathi, Rhodes, as his girlfriend filmed him from the beach, according to local media.
Continue reading...Ioannis Sarmas appointed to replace outgoing prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis after inconclusive ballot
Greece will hold fresh elections on 25 June, with the country led by a caretaker government headed by a senior judge until the vote, after an inconclusive ballot last weekend.
The president, Katerina Sakellaropoulou, appointed Ioannis Sarmas, 66, to replace the outgoing prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, whose centre-right New Democracy party triumphed over the leftist opposition in Sunday’s poll but failed to secure a parliamentary majority.
Continue reading...Prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s party on 40% share against Syriza on 20%, with more than 90% of votes counted
Greece’s general election has failed to produce a winner despite the centre-right party of the incumbent prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, clinching 40% of the vote with more than 90% of ballots counted.
New Democracy was leading with a 20-point margin – 40.8% – over the leftist main opposition Syriza party which was trailing at just over 20.1% – a difference rarely seen since the collapse in 1974 of military rule. Even in Crete, a socialist bastion, the rightwing party had fared unexpectedly well.
Continue reading...Economic resurgence may not be enough to win Kyriakos Mitsotakis a new term in Sunday’s election
With the Acropolis behind him, Kyriakos Mitsotakis ascends to the podium amid thunderous music and the cackle of whistles and horns. It is the last rally of the last day of his re-election campaign before polls open on Sunday, and the prime minister is in a combative mood.
“Do we want stability or continuous uncertainty?” he asks. “That is the dilemma we are being called to answer.” It is a question that has dominated an election that Mitsotakis once thought he had in the bag.
Continue reading...Kyriakos Mitsotakis says on visit to Lesbos he has kept his promise to protect land and sea borders
Less than 10 days before Greeks go to the polls, the prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, has sought to emphasise the impact of his centre-right government’s “tough but fair” migration policy.
In a campaign trip to Lesbos, the Aegean island bearing the brunt of Europe-bound migratory flows, the leader claimed he had kept his promise to protect land and sea borders, with the arrival of asylum seekers radically reduced.
Continue reading...Non-binding vote bans surveillance software after concluding Hungary and Poland used it to track journalists and opponents
The EU needs tighter regulation of the spyware industry, a European parliament special committee has said, after concluding that Hungary and Poland had used surveillance software to illegally monitor journalists, politicians and activists.
A special European parliament committee voted on Monday for a temporary ban on the sale, acquisition and use of spyware while the bloc draws up common EU standards based on international law. The moratorium would be lifted only on strict conditions, including independent investigations into the abuse of spyware in the EU.
Continue reading...Crackdown on Hellenes and its Golden Dawn leader Ilias Kasidiaris could cause more problems than it solves
For two years Ilias Kasidiaris, a convicted leader of the now disbanded neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, has used social media to address supporters from Domokos prison in central Greece.
Month after month the former MP has railed against the inability of the “corrupt political regime” to govern the country in a stream of hate-filled speeches. For his 134,000 subscribers on YouTube, the exhortations are a lifeline to Kasidiaris and the Hellenes, the small nationalist party he set up shortly before being handed a 13-and-a-half-year prison term for his role in Golden Dawn. And they seem to be paying off.
Continue reading...Experience in eastern Mediterranean proves deterrence and harsh conditions do little to discourage refugees
Prominent Conservatives openly view Greece’s self-described “strict but fair” migration policies as a model to emulate. The former home secretary Priti Patel told MPs last week that “we would not be in this current situation” had she been allowed to replicate “Greek-style reception centres”.
British interest in the Greek model dates back to May 2021, when the former immigration minister Chris Philp made an “urgent” – as internal documents seen by the Guardian called it – trip to Greece. This was followed by an official visit by Patel in August 2021, who toured a newly constructed Greek camp, went out on patrol with the Greek coastguard and spoke of working “closely with Greek partners” on migration.
Continue reading...David Crouch to raise daughter of murdered Caroline Crouch in the Philippines, where her grandmother has relocated
Almost two years after the 19-year-old British student, Caroline Crouch, was murdered by her husband as she lay asleep in the couple’s Athens maisonette, her father says he will concentrate on raising his granddaughter, “who is now without” either parent.
Speaking publicly for what he said would be the last time, David Crouch, 79, told the Guardian he would leave Greece to look after Caroline’s daughter, Lydia, who is almost three, in the Philippines, “far away” from her mother’s self-confessed killer.
Continue reading...Directors such as Yorgos Lanthimos have joined campaign to save the Astor and Ideal from hotel and office developments
The spectre of two historic Athens cinemas being closed by commercial interests bent on turning them into a hotel and office block has spurred film-makers to get in front of the camera with pleas to stop the process.
Directors of international acclaim have appealed to save the buildings amid mounting public disquiet over the pace of development in one of Europe’s oldest capitals. Leading the charge, Costa-Gavras, the Paris-based film director who shot to fame with the political drama Z, released when Greece was under military rule, called the existence of the Ideal and Astor cinemas indispensable for the enjoyment of film in an era when the “barbarism” of movies being watched on TV and mobile phones was widespread.
Continue reading...Pair of suspected ‘illegals’ are thought to have been a married couple living separate lives in Brazil and Greece
Halfway through a trip to Malaysia in January, Gerhard Daniel Campos Wittich stopped messaging his girlfriend back home in Rio de Janeiro and she promptly launched a frantic search for her missing partner.
A Brazilian of Austrian heritage, Campos Wittich ran a series of 3D printing companies in Rio that made, among other things, novelty resin sculptures for the Brazilian military and sausage dog key chains.
Continue reading...PM says British Museum collection is funded by taxpayers and protected by law
Rishi Sunak has vowed to protect the Parthenon marbles from being returned to Greece, saying they remain a “huge asset” to the UK.
The prime minister stuck by commitments made by his predecessors Liz Truss and Boris Johnson to safeguard the treasures at the British Museum in London.
Continue reading...Demonstrators voice fury after revelations of staff shortages and substandard equipment revealed state of rail network
Tens of thousands have staged protest rallies in Greece as anger over a train disaster that plunged the country into mourning a week ago intensified amid widespread industrial action.
In cities nationwide, as workers staged a 24-hour general strike, demonstrators voiced fury over an accident that left 57 dead when two locomotives collided head on and at high speed outside the town of Tempe. It was the deadliest train crash on record in Greece.
Continue reading...Lawyers condemn EU asylum policies and demand freedom for young Afghans jailed for 2020 blaze at ‘hellish’ Lesbos camp
A new investigation has casts doubt on evidence used to imprison six Afghan teenagers over a fire that destroyed much of a refugee camp on the Greek island of Lesbos.
Four were sentenced to 10 years in jail for “arson with risk to endanger life” and two were given five years by a youth court. The fire reduced much of the infamous “hell on earth” Moria refugee camp to ashes in September 2020.
Continue reading...Rail employee, who was in post for only four days before the accident, addressed court for seven hours over disaster in which 57 people died
Greece’s prime minister has apologised for the worst rail accident in the country’s history as a station master facing multiple charges including involuntary manslaughter was remanded in custody after giving testimony in court.
Amid mounting protests prompted by the disaster, magistrates unanimously agreed that the 59-year-old should be detained pending trial. The employee, described by the Greek media as being in post for only four days before Tuesday’s tragedy, has not been named publicly. He appeared in court in Larissa, the city where the doomed locomotive last stopped before ramming, head-on and at high speed, into a freight train using the same track.
Continue reading...Man who admits responsibility for disaster that killed at least 57 people is now due in court on Sunday
A court appearance for the stationmaster involved in Greece’s worst-ever train disaster has been postponed as the country braces for more mass protests over the crash that killed at least 57 people.
Thousands of people have protested across the country since Tuesday’s collision between a passenger train and a freight train, with public anger mounting over government failure to manage the rail network.
Continue reading...Operation to locate missing passengers likely to be concluded three days after crash near Larissa that killed at least 57
Rescuers are expected to wrap up efforts to find the bodies of victims of a head-on collision of two trains in central Greece, as anger grows over the deadly crash.
Three days after the Thessaloniki-bound passenger train slammed into an oncoming freight train outside the town of Tempe, killing at least 57, the operation to locate missing passengers would likely be concluded, officials said.
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