Private clinics complaining
Owners of private medical clinics that work with Greece’s main public healthcare provider, EOPYY, threatened yesterday to stop treating patients because they have not been paid by the public organization recently. The private clinics claim they are owed a total of 800 million euros, 530 million of which dates back to the 2007-2011. “EOPYY has stopped paying us and we are at the point where we will respond by refusing to offer our services,” said the head of the Private Clinics’ Association, Andreas Kartapanis. “Private clinics are unable to meet their obligations and to pay staff and suppliers,” he said.
Papaconstantinou cousins.
The cousins of ex-Finance Minister Giorgos Papaconstantinou, accused of removing their names from the Lagarde list of depositors, declined to appear yesterday before the parliamentary committee that is investigating the former politician. The financial crimes squad (SDOE) on Monday submitted to the committee a report indicating that four of the ex-minister’s relatives on the list had failed to declare more than 6 million euros in income. The bulk of the assets that are alleged to have been undeclared – some 4.5 million euros – have been connected to bank accounts in the names of Eleni Papaconstantinou, the ex-minister’s first cousin, and that of her husband Symeon Sykiaridis, according to sources.
Baby ring.
Police in Thessaloniki said yesterday that they had arrested two men and three women, all Bulgarian nationals, following a sting operation in which the suspects attempted to sell a newborn baby boy to two undercover police officers for 15,000 euros. The gang took the 13-day old baby and his 27-year-old mother to Thessaloniki to complete the sale from the hospital in Piraeus where she had given birth. Two more women in an advanced state of pregnancy from Bulgaria were found staying in the same apartment and are believed to have been planning to sell their babies once they were born. The suspected leaders of the gang are a man aged 52 and a woman aged 51 who are believed to have recruited pregnant women in Bulgaria and brought them into Greece illegally to give birth to their babies, which they would then sell to local couples. Investigators believe that the mothers would receive 3,000 euros from the 15,000 euros the gang charged for each sale.
Matchbox scores.
A 25-year-old Bangladeshi national faced an Athens prosecutor yesterday after police confiscated a total of one kilogram of cannabis that had been packaged into 189 matchboxes, intended for sale to local drug users. The man was stopped by officers of the force’s motorcycle-riding force unit (DIAS) at a busy junction near central Omonia Square where he is alleged to have been selling his illicit wares.