Greece - Page 14

German interior minister Horst Seehofer travelled to Turkey and Greece this week to meet with government leaders to prevent a new migrant crisis.

At least two Afghans died Sunday when a riot broke out in their rescue camp on the Greek island of Lesbos as illegal migrant numbers surge once more across the Mediterranean.

Ten undocumented Syrian migrants who were disguised as a Ukrainian volleyball team were stopped and arrested on Sunday by Greek police. All were arrested at Athens’ Eleftherios Venizelos airport after border security officials found the Ukrainian passports they were carrying

Greek police said Saturday they have arrested a suspect in the 1985 hijacking of a flight from Athens that became a multi-day ordeal and included the slaying of an American.

Yasin Aktay, a senior adviser to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his AKP party, fumed at Saudi Arabia on Thursday for allegedly “favoring the Europeans and non-Muslims” over Turkey and Islamic countries because the Saudis do not appear to support Turkish claims on Cyprus.

Greece’s coast guard says it has seized a sailing boat and arrested two people on suspicion of trying to smuggle 37 migrants to Italy.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has demanded international aid to help with the Syrian migrants in his country, threatening to “open the gates” to Europe.

THESSALONIKI, Greece (AP) — About 1,500 asylum-seekers were being transported from Greece’s eastern Aegean island of Lesbos to the mainland Monday as part of government efforts to tackle massive overcrowding in refugee camps and a recent spike in the number of people arriving from the nearby Turkish coast.

An Iranian oil tanker blacklisted by the U.S. Treasury is steaming slowly near the coast of Syria. The ship-tracking website MarineTraffic.com reveals the Adrian Darya 1 slowed to a near-stop on Sunday some 50 nautical miles off Syria.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) – Greece’s prime minister and his national security advisers decided Saturday to transfer refugees from overcrowded migrant camps on its eastern islands to the mainland and accelerate the deportation of rejected applicants for asylum without giving them the right to appeal.

At least 500 migrants have landed on the Greek island of Lesbos this week from Turkey in a single day, as conditions on the islands in the Aegean continue to deteriorate.

The new conservative Greek government is looking to enforce stricter migration controls, claiming that its capacity to house incoming migrants is deteriorating by the day. Giorgos Koumoutsakos, a member of the now ruling New Democracy party, blamed the prior leftist

Greece’s newly elected prime minister has said during a visit in Berlin that he hopes Germany will agree to start negotiations on war reparations.

SKOPJE, North Macedonia (AP) – North Macedonia police say a 20-year old migrant from Bangladesh was killed and 12 others injured when a van packed with migrants collided with a truck on the main highway in the south.

French President Emmanuel Macron and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis agreed to push for more solidarity in the European Union over the migrant crisis.

Western intelligence sources told Fox News on Tuesday that Iran has dispatched another oil tanker to Syria in defiance of U.S. sanctions. Meanwhile, the first sanctions-busting ship was leased to the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in another apparent gesture of defiance to the United States.

The U.S. State Department on Monday warned Greece not to allow the Iranian oil tanker Adrian Darya 1 to dock because the ship is carrying “illicit oil to fuel the Iranian regime’s and Syrian regime’s campaigns of terror and oppression.” Greek officials insisted they have not received a request from the tanker for docking, even though its destination appears to be the Greek port of Kalamata.

ATHENS, Greece (AP) – The Metropolitan Amvrosios of Kalavryta, a fiery conservative Greek Orthodox bishop known for criticizing, often in intemperate terms, those who he believed acted in a “non-Christian” or “non-Greek” way, including gays, migrants, and politicians, has resigned.

Sailors from France, Greece and the United States have arrived aboard their vessels and joined by the Israelis off the Israeli port city of Haifa for a major four-day naval exercise called Mighty Waves.

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — A doctor, two medical staff members, and a translator have been arrested at a state-run camp for migrants and refugees in Greece, accused of issuing medical notes for non-existent conditions to exempt migrants from deportation.

Turkey on Tuesday hit back at E.U. measures designed to punish Ankara for its illegal drilling operations off Cyprus, alleging anti-Turkish “prejudice and bias” in the decision while adding the fine will “in no way” affect the country’s activities in the eastern Mediterranean.

When Turkey dispatched a second ship to drill for oil and gas in disputed waters off Cyprus last month, it drew fire not just from rival Nicosia but also the rebuke of Western allies and threats of EU sanctions.

The death toll from a violent storm that struck northern Greece increased to seven Thursday, after a body found at sea off the coast of the stricken area was identified as that of a missing fisherman.

The body of a prominent American scientist was discovered in a cave on the Greek island of Crete nearly a week after she went missing to go for a daily run.

Conservative party leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis was being sworn in as Greece’s new prime minister Monday, a day after his resounding win over left-wing Alexis Tsipras, who led the country through the tumultuous final years of its international bailouts.

(AFP) — Greek voters will cast their ballots on Sunday in the country’s first national election of the post-bailout era, with leftist Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s Syriza party expected to be ousted by the conservative opposition.

Greek authorities say arsonists have targeted two vehicles owned by Turkish nationals, one of them a diplomat, in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki, destroying the cars and damaging another four.

A fresh demand from Greece for Germany to pay reparations for crimes committed during World War I and the Nazi occupation of World War II was rejected Wednesday.

Turkey’s Greek, Armenian, and Assyrian Christian communities, who predominated in the region before its colonisation by Turkic Muslims, were subjected to a “staggered campaign of genocide” from 1894 to 1924, which reduced them from 20 per cent of the population to less than 2 per cent, according to Israeli researchers. 

Greek authorities say a far-left extremist convicted of 11 murders has been placed in intensive care after a 15-day hunger strike that has triggered violent protests by political sympathizers.

The U.S. ambassador to Greece has condemned a vandalism attack on his home in Athens, after paint was thrown at the wall outside his residence near the embassy.

DIAVATA, Greece (AP) – Hundreds of protesting migrants have clashed with police for a third straight day outside an overcrowded camp, with migrants throwing rocks at officers who responded with tear gas and stun grenades.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan proposed converting the fabled Hagia Sophia into a mosque on Sunday. The Greek government responded with anger on Monday, pointing out that the Hagia Sophia was the seat of Greek Orthodox Christianity for centuries and has been designated a World Heritage Site by the United Nations.

BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — A Syrian man suspected of having taken part in beheadings carried out by the Islamic State in Homs has been taken into custody and questioned by authorities in Hungary.

I’m loving the BBC’s documentary series Why Voting Brexit Is The Best Thing We Ever Did. It’s really called Inside Europe: 10 Years of Turmoil but my title’s better and truer.

Outwardly, Komotini looks like other Greek cities, but there is a major difference: it has nine mosques whereas there are none in Athens.