Athens Sends Demarche to Ankara On Farmakonisi Incident

The Hellenic Foreign Ministry ordered its Embassy in Turkey on Tuesday to issue a demarche to the Ankara government over the incident that was recorded earlier in the day east of Farmakoniki island. As reported earlier on HellasFrappe at 0:300 and while patrolling the area, a FRONTEX vessel received a warning from Ankara to leave because they had violated "Turkish" territorial waters. The FRONTEX team immediately contacted the Greek coastguard because they knew they were in Greek territorial waters and a vessel was sent to the area. The two coastguard vessels then came face to face in a very heated confrontation. The article which we had featured was based on a news report from the military news site defencenet.  (Read full article here)

In the demarche, the Ministry wanted it to be understood that the incident could have triggered an "accident" -or a hot episode- that could have had incalculable consequences in terms of the stability of the entire region of Southeast Mediterranean. In a strict and unusual harsh tone, the demarche would warn Turkey that episodes such as the one marked on Tuesday morning near Farmakoniki are in danger of not being viewed (by all concerned) as simple violations but can easily result to the loss of blood and even war.

"Following a briefing that was given to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from the Department of Marine and the Aegean about the incident violating Greek territorial waters from a vessel of the Turkish Coast Guard, which after making dangerous maneuvers resulted in the bumping the Greek Coast Guard vessel that was patrolling (the area) while executing the "Poseidon 2012 " Operation, instructions were given to the Greek Embassy in Ankara to issue a demarche (to the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs) in which it will stress that similar actions pose a threat of a risk borne accident  and do not strengthen the climate between the two countries as well as do not contribute to the effective tackling of illegal immigration."

Article in Greek - defencenet

Diaspora LeaderThat Wanted To Buyout 600 Billion Greek Debt - Convicted Of Tax Evasion

credit AegeanTimes

The story we featured here on HellasFrappe last week about the "End the National Debt" organization which wants to buy out the Greek national debt, (600 billion worth) definitely generated a lot of talk on the Internet and from what we learn many reporters in Greece have now set out on a scavenger hunt to uncover as much information as they can about this organization, the money it claims to have in Canadian banks as well as the mysterious Bank of the Orient and the TRILLION dollar bonds. The organization is made up of expatriate Greeks, most of which are Greek-Americans. (Read relevant story by clicking here)

Some blogs have even claimed that the news has even caught the attention of the prime minister's office. One such news site, the AegeanTimes, also revealed something else on Tuesday that does not paint a rosy picture of the organization's President Mr. Emmaneil Lambrakis. According to the article the Greek Diaspora is confused with Mr. Lambrakis and have raised some serious concerns about both the organization as well as the existence of the so-called account. He is, on the other, very well liked in Crete, but the Greek Diaspora does not trust his intentions.

One such person, says the same article, is Greek-American George Gialtouridis from Dover, with whom the Aegean Times came into contact several days ago.

Mr. Gialtouridis apparently questions the intentions  of Mr. Lamprakis as well as the organization "End National Dept". At the same time he revealed to the AegeanTimes that Lambrakis has been signalled out by US justice!

He says that on June 15, 1995 Mr. Emmanuel Lambrakis pleaded guilty in a US federal court and was sentenced on tax evasion. According to him, Lambrakis was placed under probation for a period of three (3) years with additional conditions that included:

• 1) that he make payments of all taxes, fines and penalties during the period of his probation and at the same time cooperate with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to determine these taxes, fines and penalties,
• 2) that he perform 200 hours of community service, where he would use his medical knowledge,
• 3) that he be confined to his home for a period of four (4) months, with the exception of going to work, church, doctor visits or while he was performing his 200 hours community service and that he would have to pay back a fine of $10,000.00, by no later than August 31, 1995.

The site even included the links to the public entries regarding the federal court's decision (found at the end of this article).

All this, of course, does not in anyway mean that the bank account, or funds do not exist.

Already, there are mixed feelings on whether or not a bank can disburse a "bill ward," of US Treasury bonds. A bank, which apparently was also involved with the Justice Department of Canada, just like the one that the 600 billion dollars from the Diaspora are located in!

Certainly Mr. Lambrakis has to address all these concerns, but at the same time he must also provide some kind of tangible proof that this money exists! In other words, he must put a stop to generalizations and vague references about this money and lay his cards on the table. If he does, then all the doubts and concerns from Greeks all over the world will be wiped away in a split second because right now they do not know what to believe.

We must reiterate that just because Lambrakis was convicted of tax evasion does not automatically mean that the project (and especially these funds) are non-existent. Also, it doesn't mean that he has not been reformed either.

What it does do however, is confuse us even more.

THE JUDGMENT OF THE FEDERAL COURT OF USA

9:94-cr-00772-MLO
USA v. Lambrakis
Date filed: 07/21/1994
Date terminated: 06/15/1995
Date of last filing: 09/08/1997

JUDGMENT Emmanuel Lambrakis (1) count (s) 2. Judgment in a Criminal Case, by Orenstein, M. on 6/15/95; dft pleaded guilty to count 2 of a 2 count indictment; count 1 is dismissed on the motion of the US; dft shall pay a special assessment of $ 25.00 for count 2, which shall be due immediately; dft is placed on probation for a term of 3 years; additional conditions: 1) during the term of probation, dft is to make payments of all back taxes, fines and penalties; dft is to cooperate with the IRS in determining such back taxes, fines and penalties, 2) dft is to perform 200 hours of community service, which utilize his medical skills, 3) dft is to be placed on home detention for a period 4 months; exceptions to home detention are during: work, church, doctor visits or while performing the 200 hours of community service; dft shall pay a fine of $ 10,000.00, which shall be paid in full no later than 8/31/95 (Signed by Magistrate Michael L. Orenstein, Dated 6/15/95) c / m (McMahon, Carol)

http://a836-acris.nyc.gov/Scripts/DocSearch.dll/Detail?Doc_ID=2012011101436009
http://a836-acris.nyc.gov/Scripts/DocSearch.dll/Detail?Doc_ID=2009021300124008
http://a836-acris.nyc.gov/Scripts/DocSearch.dll/Detail?Doc_ID=2007102901236015

Source in Greek - AegeanTimes

Police Make 104 Arrests At Athens Riots (VIDEOS and PHOTOS)

The police arrested 104 people on Tuesday when an organized march to Parliament to protest against the planned austerity measures turned violent. Once again, people were  not allowed to protest peacefully and scattered quickly from Syntagma Square as soon as a group of hooligans and provocateurs infiltrated the protests and began to throw bottles, Molotov bombs and other items at the riot police. They also set fire to the National Botanical Forest, as well as burned down several stalls that were set up on the Square, one of which belonged to the "Smile of the Child" (Hamogelo Tou Paidiou). The following videos were filmed by newsbeast.gr, as well as newsit.gr.

 

 

Residents Chase Illegal Immigrants in Plateia Amerikis (VIDEOS)

credit - makeleio.gr

Residents that live around the area of Plateia Amerikis -in central Athens- took the law into their own hands on Monday night and descended to the infamous square in the framework of chasing away the numerous criminal groups that operate narcotics and prostitution shops there (as well as conduct other types of crimes). Most of the criminal rings are operated by illegal immigrants.

Frustrated with the indifference of the State, as well as poor security in the area, the residents here decided to take their neighborhoods back.  At around 11 pm, they literally set out on a manhunt, and minor incidents were reported to have occurred between locals and illegal immigrants in the narrow and dark alleys near the square. This continued for at least three more hours.

And here is where it gets interesting. The residents in this area have been resorting to this method for quite some time now. They take to the streets every night, half a sleep, risking their lives because they are determined to take back their neighborhoods from the drug traffickers, the murderers, the thugs, the prostitutes and the other criminals. They were met by riot police who did not permit them to enter a building where illegal immigrants lived.

The following videos were recorded from last night's events and were posted on the newsite makeleio.gr.

Editor's Note - These residents have every right to want to live in a neighborhood that is free of crime. We bet one of Mr. Soros' NGO's will come out with a news flash today or tomorrow and begin characterizing Greeks as racists again. Doesn't the state realize that this is what happens when it is totally indifferent to the peoples needs? People want to feel safe in their homes. By tolerating all the criminal acts that have been recorded by these groups of peoples, which the government said on Monday amounted for half of all the crime in Greece, then what do you expect the people to do who want to be able to go to their jobs and their daily affairs without having to worry of being robbed, raped or killed. Certainly we do not agree with such methods, but we cannot accept the indifference of the State either and we deplore the fact that this is all coming from people who forced their way into our country.

Greek Turkish Coastguard Vessels Almost Collide Off Of Farmakonisi

The Slovenians on board a FRONTEX ship that was patrolling the eastern area of Farmakonisi island on Tuesday morning were shocked when they received a command from the Turkish side to abandon the area immediately because they were sailing in Turkish territorial waters! The incident occurred at around 03:00.

The FRONTEX officials quickly contacted the Greek coastguard which in return dispatched a patrol boat to the area right away. When the Greek coastguard vessel arrived it too received the same command, but refused to budge and sent a loud warning to the Turkish vessel instead: "This is Greece and you have to leave immediately".

The Turkish vessel did not leave either, and instead attempted to ram the Greek coastguard vessel by sailing past it in high speed and taking full advantage of its superior abilities as a vessel (the relevant boat is one of the new 11meter Turkish coastguard vessels).

This obviously provoked the Greek side, and then both parties armed their boats and soon after their weapons were unlocked. For a few seconds there was silence but the professionalism and calmness of our coastguard officials prevailed and they informed the Turkish vessel that they would lower their weapons with the condition that they did the same, and they did.

Despite the fact that the Greek boat is quite aged, its captain managed to avoid an explosive incident.

Since the incident this morning, one thing is certain, there is a lot of mobility in the area, as well as the island. Framakonisi has two or three fishermen who reside there permanently as well as a large platoon of soldiers. We must also reiterate that the sovereignty of this Greek island has never been recognized by Turkey.

Article in Greek defencenet

Move Over TEKEN - The "Beatings In The Greek Parliament" Game Is Here (VIDEO)

UNBELIEVABLE But True. If you were glued to your television sets earlier this year when Golden Dawn's Ilias Kassidiaris slapped Greek Communist (KKE) MP Liana Kanneli following a very heated argument, and have always wondered what it would be like if Lianna slapped out Ilias. Or if you have ever wondered what it would feel like to wrestle former PASOK MP Theodore Pangalos, then look no further HellasFrappe has the answer.: Gamers, push your TEKEN games to the side... the "Beatings In The Greek Parliament" game is here. Help Lianna to train hard so she can finally get in the ring and kick Kassidiari's butt (or vice versa). Or get down and sweaty with bad boy Theodore Pangalos, killer Aleka Papariga and all your favorite politicians. The new electronic game is getting set to make its debut and recently released a promo video on YouTube.  The game is an innovation of Greek techies who decided to step away from traditional protests and begin capitalizing on Greek politicians.LOL

DEH Cuts Off Illegal Electricity Usage By Roma, And They Attack DEH (VIDEO)

While looking for a great offbeat article on Tuesday we stumbled on a real jewel. The gypsies or Roma people in Thiva took to the streets on Monday to protest against the Public State Corporation (DEH's) decision to finally cut off their power. Sounds cruel huh? Think again. This group has never paid an electricity bill in their lives, and were illegally consuming the electricity for years! This inflated the electricity costs for the area and local residents were forced to pay the bill.

But the Roma does not seem to comprehend why they cannot continue to steal electricity and force the bill on others and for this reason they decided to assemble. When they reached the DEH building in this regional town, they were greeted by security officials and riot police. After realizing that they could not seize the building, they decided to take drastic measures and began pelting the building with tomatoes and eggs.

In our opinion the State acted wisely, the illegal usage of electricity is a crime.

But did the Roma people "get it" or better yet... did they finally realize that this was against the law? Not on your life.. as announced in the video below, they plan to escalate their protests....!!!

Go figure!

Επίθεση με ντομάτες και αυγά στην ΔΕΗ Θήβας, από... από LAMIASTARGR

Hubble Travels To X-Treme to Assemble Deepest Ever View Of The Universe (VIDEO)

AST XDF Hubble eXtreme Deep Field 20120925 12.54 MB 2382x2078 hs-2012-37-a-full_tif (Photo credit: rmforall@gmail.com)

Astronomers working with the Hubble Space Telescope have outdone themselves this time, taking the deepest-ever view of the Universe.  Like photographers assembling a portfolio of their best shots, astronomers have assembled a new, improved portrait of our deepest-ever view of the Universe. Called the eXtreme Deep Field, or XDF, the photo was assembled by combining ten years of NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope observations taken of a patch of sky within the original Hubble Ultra Deep Field. The XDF is a small fraction of the angular diameter of the full Moon.

The Hubble Ultra Deep Field is an image of a small area of space in the constellation of Fornax (The Furnace), created using Hubble Space Telescope data from 2003 and 2004. By collecting faint light over one million seconds of observation, the resulting image revealed thousands of galaxies, both nearby and very distant, making it the deepest image of the Universe ever taken at that time.

The new full-colour XDF image is even more sensitive than the original Hubble Ultra Deep Field image, thanks to the additional observations, and contains about 5500 galaxies, even within its smaller field of view. The faintest galaxies are one ten-billionth the brightness that the unaided human eye can see [1].

Magnificent spiral galaxies similar in shape to the Milky Way and its neighbour the Andromeda galaxy appear in this image, as do large, fuzzy red galaxies in which the formation of new stars has ceased. These red galaxies are the remnants of dramatic collisions between galaxies and are in their declining years as the stars within them age.

Peppered across the field are tiny, faint, and yet more distant galaxies that are like the seedlings from which today’s magnificent galaxies grew. The history of galaxies — from soon after the first galaxies were born to the great galaxies of today, like the Milky Way — is laid out in this one remarkable image.

Hubble pointed at a tiny patch of southern sky in repeat visits made over the past decade with a total exposure time of two million seconds [2]. More than 2000 images of the same field were taken with Hubble’s two primary cameras: the Advanced Camera for Surveys and the Wide Field Camera 3, which extends Hubble’s vision into near-infrared light. These were then combined to form the XDF.

“The XDF is the deepest image of the sky ever obtained and reveals the faintest and most distant galaxies ever seen. XDF allows us to explore further back in time than ever before,” said Garth Illingworth of the University of California at Santa Cruz, principal investigator of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field 2009 (HUDF09) programme.

The Universe is 13.7 billion years old, and the XDF reveals galaxies that span back 13.2 billion years in time. Most of the galaxies in the XDF are seen when they were young, small, and growing, often violently as they collided and merged together. The early Universe was a time of dramatic birth for galaxies containing brilliant blue stars far brighter than our Sun. The light from those past events is just arriving at Earth now, and so the XDF is a time tunnel into the distant past when the Universe was just a fraction of its current age. The youngest galaxy found in the XDF existed just 450 million years after the Universe’s birth in the Big Bang.

Before Hubble was launched in 1990, astronomers were able to see galaxies up to about seven billion light-years away, half way back to the Big Bang. Observations with telescopes on the ground were not able to establish how galaxies formed and evolved in the early Universe.

Hubble gave astronomers their first view of the actual forms of galaxies when they were young. This provided compelling, direct visual evidence that the Universe is truly changing as it ages. Like watching individual frames of a motion picture, the Hubble deep surveys reveal the emergence of structure in the infant Universe and the subsequent dynamic stages of galaxy evolution.

The NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope (Webb telescope), scheduled for launch in 2018, will be aimed at the XDF, and will study it with its infrared vision. The Webb telescope will find even fainter galaxies that existed when the Universe was just a few hundred million years old. Because of the expansion of the Universe, light from the distant past is stretched into longer, infrared wavelengths. The Webb telescope’s infrared vision is ideally suited to push the XDF even deeper, into a time when the first stars and galaxies formed and filled the early “dark ages” of the Universe with light.
 

(The video animation of the new Hubble eXtreme Deep Field, took 10 years to assemble, with over 2 million seconds of exposure time.)

IMF Accuses Motor Oil Hellas and Hellenic Petroleum of Greek Market Fuel Manipulation

The Wall Street Journal featured an article at the weekend stating that Greece’s fuel market is divided between the two refineries, namely Motor Oil Hellas Corinth Refineries and Hellenic Petroleum (ELPE), which it says are involved in manipulative and anti-competitive practices. The article said that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said that one of the reasons for the high price of fuel to end users in the country is because of a non-existent competitive market 

"Hellenic Petroleum, the larger of the two firms, is controlled by shipping and oil tycoon Spiros Latsis, who owns 41.9%. The Greek government owns a 35.5% stake.
Messrs. Vardinoyannis and Latsis have high profiles in Greece. Mr. Latsis, whose family also controls Greece's second-biggest bank and a leading property developer, is ranked as Greece's second-richest man by Forbes. His net worth of $2.6 billion puts him just a bit below American television celebrity Oprah Winfrey in the global billionaires' league table.
The report says that "consumers and producers, taxpayers, independent and franchised gas stations" would all benefit from liberalization. But it warned that "owners and employees of the two refineries and their wholesalers" as well as "customs officials" would likely resist change."

Wall Street Journal read more

In reply to the article, ELPE released the following press release:

"Commentary on Wall Street Journal article
 
24/09/2012
 
On September 22nd 2012, The Wall Street Journal published an article titled “IMF: Lack of Competition Hurts Greek Fuel Market”, extracts of which were reproduced by Greek media. This article, allegedly based on a draft internal report by the International Monetary Fund, starts off by stating that “lack of competition in Greece’s oil-refining industry is costing consumers (in Greece) more than $1 billion a year”. HELLENIC PETROLEUM requested from the WSJ journalist and received a copy of the unsigned report, attributed to the IMF, and strongly refutes, as utterly unfounded, a number of assertions made therein. More specifically:
    The assertion that – allegedly – Greek consumers are burdened with a cost of “more than $1 billion a year” is entirely inaccurate and is based on cursory analysis and wrong calculations. The alleged “burden” results from the fact that the analyst used a wrong pre-tax price for heating gasoil, overstated by €367/m3 versus the real pre-tax price. It seems that the analyst used September 2012 retail prices, but subtracted the lower Excise Duty rate, which only applies during winter months and is in fact 7 times lower. This wrong pre-tax price, multiplied by the annual domestic consumption of heating gasoil, returned the erroneous “burden” result of €1 billion a year. In reality, the Greek consumer pays a pre-tax heating gasoil price at levels comparable to the average of the 27 EU countries.
    The article also mentions that, due to “lack of competition”, Greek consumers pay too much for unleaded gasoline. The truth is that the high prices result from the particularly high Excise Duty and VAT rate of 23%, which came into effect in 2010. Pre-tax retail unleaded gasoline price in Greece ranges close to the average of Eurozone countries. And this is despite the fact that the distribution costs in Greece are higher due to the country’s geographical dispersion and particularities.
    Furthermore, the article makes reference to an alleged lack of competition in the Greek fuel market. This is a recurrent misconception, as, despite the market’s small size, the level of competition in the Greek fuel market is high. More specifically, there are two refining companies in Greece, when in other small European countries (Austria, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Lithuania, Malta, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia), only one or no refining company is in operation. In Greece, there are also 19 fuels marketing companies, of which 13 are entirely independent from the two integrated refiners. There are 6,500 petrol stations operating in Greece, accounting for the highest per capita number of stations in Europe, more than double the European average.
    Additionally, for a number of years there is no legal provision prohibiting fuel imports by fuels marketing companies in Greece. Low imported fuel volumes in Greece are entirely the result of highly competitive domestic ex-refinery prices and not of an alleged constraint in storage facilities, as claimed frequently.
    Consequently, the report which the WSJ invokes and attributes to the IMF includes serious inaccuracies. The claims regarding an alleged lack of competition and profiteering in the Greek fuel market do not stand. On the contrary, some of the “reforms” proposed in the report are more likely to underpin chronic illegal fuel trade practices that cost the Greek State more than €500m in foregone tax revenues each year.

    HELLENIC PETROLEUM suffers from such groundless and inaccurate assertions and reserves its right to take all appropriate legal action it deems necessary to protect its reputation."

Nation-Wide Strike Paralyzes Greece

The Confederation of Greek Workers (GSEE) and the public servants union (ADEDY) are planning to paralyze the country today with a nationwide strike against planned new State spending cuts of more than 11.5 billion euros. Hospitals are operation with skeleton staffs, and travel will be very difficult for several hours, or while the strikes are being held.

Taking part in the strike are doctors, university professors, teachers, hospital staff, ambulance workers, lawyers and civil servants. Moreover, banks will be closed since bank employees join the strike, as will petrol stations which will close until 3 p.m. 

Transport will also be affected as airlines, ferries and some metro lines will undergo a work stoppage. Some airline companies such as EasyJet were obligated to re-schedule approximately 30 flights on account of a three-hour walkout by air traffic controllers.

If you want to watch the protests LIVE, then you can visit zoogla.gr by clicking here.