January 2014 – Page 6 – GREEK WORLD MEDIA

Bruised Greek Socialists Face Polls Under New Name

Source: Associated Press

Greece’s once-dominant Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement, or Pasok, will participate in May’s European Parliament elections as part of a new center-left alliance and not independently, after popular support for the party collapsed during the country’s painful economic bailout.

Pasok officials said Monday that its candidates would seek election in the May 22-25 polls under a newly formed Progressive Democrats’ Party, created by center-left politicians and academics. A similar alliance is also planned for local government elections, also planned for May.

The Socialists dominated Greek politics for decades, but their popularity has been hammered as voters blamed the party for the country’s severe financial crisis and grew angry at austerity measures imposed under the country’s bailout.

Support for Pasok fell below 5 percent in a December tracking poll, tumbling from nearly 44 percent in a landslide general election victory in 2009.

“We would like to see our cooperation extended to national elections … Our party salutes the decision to create a broader alliance,” Dimitris Karidis, a Pasok spokesman, told the AP.

Pasok is currently the junior coalition partner in government with its traditional rivals, the center-right New Democracy, as the two parties face a growing challenge from anti-bailout political groups.

The Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement was founded 40 years ago by charismatic late prime minister Andreas Papandreou, months after the collapse of a military dictatorship, and swept to power in 1981. The party presided over extended periods of economic growth, spending 24 years in one-party governments and coalitions, but has been criticized for patronage in the public sector and cronyism.

The party currently dominates local government as well as the country’s representation in the European Parliament.

Analyst George Tzogopoulos said Pasok’s decision could limit the extent of its expected punishing defeat in the upcoming elections.

“The more the center-left is united, the better for them,” said Tzogopoulos, a senior researcher at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy.

“Although the main challenge for them remains their alienation from voters, wider cooperation could soften the expected blow at the ballot box.”

Greek Orthodox Church’s celebration of Epiphany at La Perouse

Source: SMH

NSW to swelter for most of the week

New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia are set for scorchers this week with all three states expected to hit 40 degrees. Nine News.

Temperatures will top 40 degrees in many parts of NSW this week.

Towns beyond the Great Dividing Range are likely to experience extreme heat as early as Monday.

Residents in Sydney’s western suburbs might be tempted to head to the beach by mid-week, with the mercury in Penrith expected to hit the high 30s from Wednesday.

Leap of faith: Members of the Greek community keep their cool during the Orthodox Church’s celebration of the Epiphany. Photo: Dean Sewell

Respite from the heat won’t be felt until Saturday, when there will be a cooler southerly change.

Weatherzone meteorologist Sam Brown said those on the coast will be spared record temperature highs, with sea breezes keeping temperatures down.

Temperatures for the Australian Open in Melbourne will be about 40 from Tuesday to Friday.

Sydney’s beaches were packed on Sunday. Several thousand members of Sydney’s Greek community turned out for the Greek Orthodox Church’s celebration of Epiphany at La Perouse.

The event is capped by the holy cross event, this year taken out by Theodore Pasialis, who was the first of 150-odd young men to retrieve a cross thrown into the water.

The Greek Orthodox community’s annual Blessing of the Waters yesterday, with the winner Illias Gore, 17, of New Lambton

Source: theherald.com.au

Greek Orthodox church Epiphany blessing of the waters. Illias Gore (17yrs) of New lambton retrieved the cross from the Bogey Hole. Pic: Ryan Osland

ILLIAS Gore managed to double his luck yesterday, claiming the top honour in the Greek Orthodox community’s Blessing of the Waters.

Almost a dozen unmarried men from the church took the plunge yesterday, seeking a silver cross hurled into the cliffside pool.

Held at the Bogey Hole since 1957, the ceremony marks Christ’s baptism in the River Jordan where the Holy Trinity appeared for the first time.

Participants pray for Australia’s prosperity and seek safety for those working at sea before the scramble for a silver cross, with the parishioner who retrieves it earning a year of good luck.

New Lambton’s Mr Gore, 17, found the cross quickly in the pristine Bogey Hole.

Diving for the third time, Mr Gore took the honours for the second consecutive year.

He said extra luck would be welcome in an important year ahead.

“Hopefully, it will help me with my HSC and get into what I want to do, which is chiropractic,” he said.

“It means a fair bit to me but I think it means a lot more to my [grandmother] and her family in Greece.”

Among the onlookers were Newcastle councillor Nuatali Nelmes and NSW opposition spokesperson for local government Sophie Cotsis.

Ms Cotsis, who normally attends a blessing of the waters at Yarra Bay in Sydney, said she was blown away by the Newcastle event set in cliffs similar to the Greek landscape.

“We should promote it and get more people to come,” she said.

Father Nicholas Scordilis said the weather was perfect but a mix-up with keys meant only “a fifth” of parishioners could access the pool.

“I’m not blaming anybody, we just had the wrong key,” he said.

“But the weather was beautiful, it went very well.”

Epiphany Day celebrations at Matilda Bay Reserve WA

Source: TheWestAustralian

True believers take the plunge The West Australian

As the cross arced upwards from the priest’s hand and splashed into the Swan River, the crowd of young men rushed forward.

Dozens from the Greek Orthodox Christian faith plunged into the water at Matilda Bay Reserve to retrieve the Holy Cross, as part of the annual Epiphany Day celebrations.

Jason Saldaris was jubilant to retrieve the cross – seen as a great blessing – surfacing with it in hand and kissing it before bringing it ashore.

Greek Orthodox parish priest Father Elpidios Karalis, who hosted the annual Blessing of the Waters at Matilda Bay yesterday, said Mass attendance at Church was “stable”.

“There’s always room for improvement,” he said. “You see people on feast days, at Easter, at Christmas, but not everyone comes every Sunday.”

For winning the event, in which young men and women dived into the river to retrieve the cross, Mr Saldaris got a gold chain.

“The reason we throw the cross in the river is it sanctifies the Lord and all creation,” Father Elpidios said.

He recalled attending the event as a young boy, and said it was wonderful to see so many young families there.

Jordan finds cross during Epiphany dive at North Wollongong rock pool

Source: illawarramercury.com.au

Jordan Wallace, left, was the first to retrieve the cross from North Wollongong rock pool. Pictures: ANDY ZAKELI

Greek Orthodox Christians celebrated the Epiphany yesterday with traditional cross-throwing ceremonies around Wollongong Harbour.

Members of the Saint Nektarios Greek Orthodox Church in Wollongong gathered at the North Wollongong rock pool for a ceremony conducted by Father Savas Pizanias. The cross was retrieved by Jordan Wallace.

Meanwhile, spectators also lined the shores of Wollongong Harbour for a blessing ceremony by Wollongong’s Holy Cross Greek Orthodox Church, which is part of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Australia.

Church of the Holy Cross priest Andrew Joannou said the blessing of the water ceremony was held each year to mark the Epiphany, the day Jesus is said to have been revealed as the son of God.

“Afterwards we throw the Holy Cross, which is the symbol of victory and immortality, into the waters to sanctify the waters and keep them safe,” he said.

Port Kembla’s George Ellenis, who is a long-time winner of the honour, lived up to his reputation yesterday and retrieved the holy cross for the ninth time.

The annual event is one of the most important days on the Greek Orthodox calendar and is celebrated worldwide.

The Blessing of the Waters is an ancient celebration that commemorates the baptism of Jesus.

Epiphany Festival: Fishing for a year of good luck

Epiphany Festival

Spectators attend the festival at Yarra Bay. Photo: Dean Sewell

Theodore Pasialis’s feat in fishing a holy cross from the bottom of the ocean as part of the Greek Orthodox Church’s celebration of the Epiphany is supposed to bring him a year’s luck. So why does he feel bad?

Because it was not so much luck but arduous years of hard training that put him in front of the pack of more than 150 young men from the Greek Australian community in the 50 metre sprint from a barge in Yarra Bay at La Perouse.

The former elite swimmer and gold medallist in the men’s 1500 metres at the 2008 Oceania Swimming Championships has won the Blessing of the Waters race twice before, in 2011 and 2012. So “it may be controversial in the Greek community”, he laughs. “I feel bad going in for the holy cross event, because it is an unfair advantage”.

Several thousand members of Sydney’s Greek community turned out for the festivities with traditional Greek dancing and food – souvlaki, spanakopita and honey donuts called loukoumades – typical of a Greek glenti, or party.

Simultaneous events around the country have been celebrating the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist. The Blessing of the Waters ceremony commemorates “the sacredness of creation which gives us the responsibility to care for the world and care for one anther”, said Dr Philip Kariatlis, academy director at St Andrews Greek Orthodox Theological College.

The winner, Pasialis, 24, was a bit hazy on the spiritual underpinnings of the race. But he reckoned it was sheer luck that let him to find the cross. “That is the lucky bit. You need a bit of luck to see it”, he says. The prize? A small religious token – and a year’s luck.

A real blessing for the Greek community in Cairns

Source: TheCairnsPost

blessing

SAFE AND SOUND: Evan Ward, 11, emerges from the water at Kurrimine Beach grasping the cross. Picture: REGI VARGHESE Source: CairnsPost

THE Far Northern Greek community has paid homage to a centuries-old tradition, gathering at two beaches yesterday for the annual Blessing of the Waters.

Trinity Beach and Kurrimine Beach played host to the Greek Orthodox ceremony, which symbolises the baptism of Christ in the Jordan River.

While the rain put a dampener on celebrations at Trinity Beach, about 50 people turned out to see three young, single Greek men dive underwater to find a golden cross.

In the early days of Orthodox faith, only young sailors participated as a way of giving them good luck at sea.

“The weather didn’t help, but we still did what we had to do,” St John The Baptist Greek Orthodox Parish priest Father Menelaos Hatzoglou said.

“It was really enjoyable … The cross was found within 10 minutes and brought back to my hands.

“Then I blessed every diver and all the congregation as well.”

The crowd then returned to the parish hall for a traditional Greek barbecue.

Further south, the rain stayed away at Kurrimine Beach as between 100 and 150 people gathered to watch another three young men perform the same tradition.

“It was a bit windy, but it was a nice day,” Greek Orthodox Community of Innisfail and Districts president John Kotzas said.

“Everyone was happy. It’s a joyous occasion.”

Three more Greek far-right party MPs arrested

Challenge memory and attention with scientific brain games.

Supporters of ultra-nationalist party Golden Dawn shout slogans outside a courthouse in Athens.

Supporters of ultra-nationalist party Golden Dawn shout slogans outside a courthouse in Athens. Photo: AFP

Athens: Three more far-right Golden Dawn lawmakers have been detained pending trial in Greece on charges of belonging to a criminal group, as part of a crackdown on the party following the killing of an anti-fascist rapper by one of its supporters last year.

The stabbing of Pavlos Fissas in September, to which a Golden Dawn sympathiser has confessed, provoked protests across the country, a shake up of the police and a broad investigation into the party.

Party leader Nikos Mihaloliakos and dozens more senior party officials were arrested last September, riveting a country which has not witnessed a mass round-up of elected politicians since a military coup nearly five decades ago.

Golden Dawn members have been charged on evidence linking the party with a string of attacks, including Fissas’s stabbing and the killing of an immigrant last year.

The party, whose six out of 18 lawmakers including Mr Mihaloliakos have been remanded in custody until their trial, called the probe by investigating magistrates “a parody”.

“We’re talking about the biggest judicial coup in Greece’s modern political history,” the party said on its website on Sunday.

Lawmakers Yorgos Germenis, Panagiotis Iliopoulos and Stathis Boukouras denied the charges against them in marathon plea sessions on Saturday and Sunday. Golden Dawn denies any involvement in Fissas’s killing.

“Golden Dawn is a legitimate political party taking on a sincere political struggle,” Mr Iliopoulos told reporters outside the court, flanked by dozens of flag-waving supporters, some chanting the party’s slogan of “Blood! Honour! Golden Dawn!”.

“We will not buckle. Golden Dawn will be victorious – Greece will be victorious,” he said.

Party supporters who waited outside the court jeered when the verdict for two of the lawmakers was announced just before midnight on Saturday, hurling insults and water bottles at gathered journalists.

Golden Dawn, whose emblem resembles a swastika and whose members have been seen giving Nazi-style salutes, rose from being a fringe party to win 18 seats in parliament in elections in 2012. It rejects the neo-Nazi label.

Despite accusations of brutality, it has drawn on anger over the debt crisis, budget cuts, high unemployment and corruption to become Greece’s third most popular political force, although it lost some support after the killing.

Reuters

Abbott government planning ‘repeal day’ to cut 8000 laws

The Abbott government is planning a “repeal day” in parliament in March when it hopes to axe more than 8000 federal laws in a push to cut red tape costs.

The Australian reports that the “repeal day” is scheduled for the final parliamentary sitting week in March and is part of a federal government plan to slash red tape by $1 billion a year.

The Statute Law Revision Bill and the Amending Acts 1901-1969 Bill will propose slashing 8000 redundant laws going back around 100 years.

On the same day, parliament will be presented with a number of bills proposing the repeal of “burdensome regulations”.

The bills are to be debated in the coming weeks, with the government reportedly claiming they’ll represent the “biggest single reduction in federal laws ever put before the commonwealth parliament”.

The “repeal day” concept is said to be borrowed from the US, where congress has regular repeal days.

ASIO spying on Syria fund-raisers amid terrorism funding fears

Source: CanberraTimes

Australia’s intelligence agencies have been monitoring phone calls, freezing bank accounts and making covert home visits to warn people donating money to Syrian war victims that they suspect the funds might instead be financing terrorism.

Fairfax Media has been told that charities, community organisations and individuals have been visited by agents of the domestic spy agency ASIO, warning them not to continue sending money overseas through the channels they have been using.

Some people have received letters, without any prior warning, saying accounts had been frozen.

Community members have complained about the tactics, saying it is creating an atmosphere of fear and anxiety for people who are already ”emotional” about the plight of the Syrian people.
An Erskineville woman, Khadija, whose brother had his passport suddenly cancelled on the grounds he might ”engage in politically motivated violence”, claimed that her phone messages had been monitored by ASIO and people who had donated to her fund-raising drive had been intimidated by visits from agents warning them off.
She said ASIO told people that they had Viber messages between her and them about the donations. ”They were terrified,” she said. ”And they won’t speak to me any more.”
Yet Khadija said ASIO had not approached her or asked any questions about the fund-raising that she had been doing. She believes the Muslim community is being targeted just for trying to help people who are victims of the Syrian conflict.
”All we wanted to do was send money for the kids, and that is what we have been doing,” she said.
Sydney’s Middle Eastern communities have been working hard raising money for the victims, says community advocate Rebecca Kay.
She told Fairfax Media that people were devastated about what was taking place.
”They are very emotional – at fund-raising events they are taking the rings off their fingers and the necklaces from their necks to auction to raise money,” Ms Kay said.
But the problems have stemmed from intelligence reports the flow of some money overseas has ended up supporting banned groups involved in the conflict and not the victims. Financing terrorism is an offence under Australian law.
The Independent National Security Legislation Monitor annual report said the conflict was of concern in relation to terrorism financing. It said $21 million had been sent from Australia in the past financial year.
A spokesman for ASIO said it could not comment on operational activity. But a spokesman for the Australian Federal Police, which investigates terrorism financing offences, said the AFP understood many Australians wanted to help and might want to send money through trusted family members or friends.
But he said the best way was through legitimate UN agencies and non-government organisations that did not support either side in the conflict. That way, he said, they were not committing any offences.
One community member criticised the ”back-door approach” by authorities, saying it was not helping. She said the community was always active in fund-raising, as it was last year for bushfire victims.
”It is so simple,” she said. ”Educate the community, put some advertisements out there in the Arabic media and the local newspaper saying which charities to donate through and why.
”Visiting people at home and fearmongering isn’t right. It’s cruel. People just want to help and they already have trust issues.”
But Dr Tamer Kahil, president of the Australians for Syria Association, which has been sending money through legitimate channels, said he did not see harm in government officials coming to ask questions.
”We welcome them and open our books for them,” he said. ”I don’t want anyone to be scared.”