FACTFINDER’S CROSSWORD

Dear Reader,

As a result of the coronavirus pandemic we are suspending competition entries for all our prize crosswords. Puzzles will continue to appear as normal but no entries will be accepted or prizes given.

We hope to return to normal as soon as possible.

The solution to this week’s Factfinder crossword will appear next Saturday as usual.

Stay safe!

Joy Yates, Editorial Director

Across

1 A floating mass or expanse of gulf-weed (8)

5 Historic region of Greece on the Aegean Sea

(6)

9 Large conurbation in the Netherlands (pop

about 8.4 million) (8)

10 One invested with absolute power (6)

12 US state (8,723 sq miles; pop about 9.3

million), nicknamed the Garden State (3,6) 13 A nearly circular military cap (5)

14 Former name of a capital city in central Asia

(pop about 1.3 million) (6)

17 The people of a country in north-east Europe

(25,590 sq miles; pop about 2 million (5)

20 Unforested, or thinly-forested grasscountry in South Africa (5)

21 Citizen of a large Greek island (3,260 sq miles; pop about 635,000), a popular tourist destination (6)

24 Come back into one's mind (5)

25 Inversely heart-shaped, as a leaf (bot) (9)

28 Of a genus of orthopterous insects (6)

29 A family of flowering plants, including the

genus Linum (8)

30 Required or was obliged to do something (6) 31 Deals in illicit goods (8)

Down

1 A lascar boatswain (6)

2 A state of being widely acclaimed (6)

3 River in north-east France (221 miles long), a

tributary of the Oise (5)

4 Birds of the green cormorant species (5)

6 A region of east-central Greece (5,412 sq miles; pop 733,000), annexed by Greece in 1881 (9)

7 Things inserted into body tissue as a graft (8) 8 Directed forward or upward (8)

11 Having the terminal lobe much larger than

the lateral ones (bot) (6)

15 Grave, gloomy or phlegmatic (9)

16 A grappling iron, mooring, etc (6)

18 Main character in an old morality play (8)

19 Historic port city in south-east Spain (pop

about 330,000) (8)

22 A riding-school (6)

23 An early reception of visitors, specially by a

distinguished person (6)

26 Capital city in north Africa (pop about 9.5

million), on the River Nile (5)

27 Cheerful, mirthful, etc (5)