News archive of December 2016

Police in Thessaloniki were over the weekend trying to determine the identity of a man who was fatally injured after being hit by a taxi driven by a 32-year-old man late on Friday.

The incident occurred in the city center, at the crossing of Egnatias and Platonos streets, at around 11.30 p.m., reports said.

A moderate earthquake measuring 4.2 on the Richter scale rattled the Dodecanese island of Karpathos on Saturday morning, the Athens-based Geodynamic Institute reported.

The tremor occurred at 10.35 a.m., the institute said, adding that the quake's epicenter was located in the sea area 43 kilometers north of the island, at a depth of 10 kilometers under the seabed.

Outgoing British Ambassador to Greece John Kittmer recently gave a stirring farewell at the premises of the Benaki Museum in downtown Athens on the theme "Walking in Greece: Landscape/Narrative." Kathimerini has published excerpts of his speech, a poetic and philosophical reading of the country's landscape, which the philhellene Kittmer read out in Greek.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (left) meets with outgoing French President Francois Hollande (right) in Abu Dhabi, on Saturday, on the sidelines of UNESCO's Safeguarding Cultural Heritage Conference. The two leaders agreed on the need for a technical-level agreement to wrap up Greece's bailout review at Monday's Eurogroup meeting, as well as on debt relief by the end of the year.

A fire has erupted at a sponge factory in Istanbul's Tuzla district on Dec. 3, Doğan News Agency reported. 

Many firefighters were dispatched to the Tuzla Organized Industrial Site to fight the fire. 

The fire was taken under control after around one hour's work, which included help from choppers, daily Habertürk reported on its website on Dec. 3. 

Novinite is offering an English-language version of an interview with the Bulgarian co-producer of Aferim!, a movie awarded with a Silver Bear in Berlin in 2015.

Eurozone finance ministers meeting in Brussels Monday are not expected to reach an agreement on concluding Greece's bailout review or on debt relief but are set to debate some proposals for short-term debt lightening measures.

The mayors of three districts of Turkey's southeastern province of Hakkari have been detained on Dec. 3, while searches were being conducted in the municipality buildings, state-run Anadolu Agency reported. 

In protest at the latest round of pension cuts, a worsening tax status and increased job insecurity, seamen have declared a new 48-hour strike that will keep ships docked until Tuesday.

AP Photo/ Jae C. Hong

BELGRADE - Donald Trump, US President-elect, has chosen the retired Marine General James Mattis, an outspoken critic of the Iran nuclear agreement, to serve as his secretary of defense.