Greece

The Mall Athens is a major shopping mall in Athens, Greece. It was the first of the kind to be constructed in Greece and one of the largest shopping... and leisure centres in Southeastern Europe. The Mall Athens is located close to the Athens Olympic Stadium in the suburb of Maroussi and was opened to the public on November 25, 2005. It has approximately 200 outlets for commercial and entertainment use, spread over four levels, and covers about 58,500 square meters with 90,000 square meters of underground space. Built under the pretext of the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, its construction and operation have evolved into one of the biggest Greek scandals of the last decade involving real-estate, construction and commercial corporations, heads of government, ministers, mayors and, last but not least, the media. Its main competitors are Golden Hall, Avenue, Athens Heart and Athens Metro Mall. The Mall provides access for handicapped persons and has a play area for children, along with a babysitting service and a special children’s care area. It also has a first-aid area. Automated teller machines are available. Opening hours are Monday to Friday from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. and Saturday, 9 a.m.
more

The Parthenon is a temple on the Athenian Acropolis, Greece, dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena, whom the people of Athens considered their... virgin patron. Its construction began in 447 BC when the Athenian Empire was at the height of its power. It was completed in 438 BC, although decorations of the Parthenon continued until 432 BC. It is the most important surviving building of Classical Greece, generally considered the culmination of the development of the Doric order. Its decorative sculptures are considered some of the high points of Greek art. The Parthenon is regarded as an enduring symbol of Ancient Greece and of Athenian democracy and one of the world's greatest cultural monuments. The Greek Ministry of Culture is currently carrying out a program of selective restoration and reconstruction to ensure the stability of the partially ruined structure. The Parthenon itself replaced an older temple of Athena, which historians call the Pre-Parthenon or Older Parthenon, that was destroyed in the Persian invasion of 480 BC. The temple is archaeoastronomically aligned to the Pleiades. Like most Greek temples, the Parthenon was used as a treasury.
more

The Zappeion is a building in the National Gardens of Athens in the heart of Athens, Greece. It is generally used for meetings and ceremonies, both... official and private. In 1869, the Greek Parliament allocated 80,000 square metres of public land between the Palace Gardens and the ancient Temple of Olympian Zeus, and also passed a law on 30 November 1869, "for the building works of the Olympic Games", as the Zappeion was the first building to be erected specifically for the revival of the Olympic Games in the modern world. The ancient Panathenian stadium was also refurbished as part of the works for the Olympic Games. Following some delay, on 20 January 1874, the cornerstone of the building was laid; this new building would be designed by Danish architect Theophil Hansen. Finally, on 20 October 1888, the Zappeion opened. Unfortunately for its benefactor, Evangelis Zappas, he did not live long enough to see the Zappeion built, and his cousin Konstantinos Zappas was nominated by Evangelis Zappas to complete the building. The Austrian Parliament Building was also designed by Hansen and followed the same theme in the exterior.
more

The Helliniko Olympic Complex is situated at Ellinikon on the east coast of Greece south of Athens, approximately 16 kilometres from the Olympic... Village. It was built on the site of the former Ellinikon International Airport for the staging of the 2004 Summer Olympics and 2004 Summer Paralympics. It consists of 5 separate venues. The Olympic Baseball Centre in Athens consists of two Baseball stadiums. It was the site of the Baseball games at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece. The facility consists of two fields. The larger stadium seats 8,700 fans-though only 6,700 seats were made publicly available during the Olympics - and the smaller stadium seats 4,000 spectators- though only 3,300 seats were made publicly available during the Games. The facility had to be constructed with significant foreign help in the design, as there were only a handful of dusty baseball diamonds in the whole of Greece before the 2004 Olympics were awarded to Athens in 1997. Construction on the facility was completed on February 27, 2004, and it was officially opened on August 12, 2004, a day before the Opening Ceremonies.
more

The Battle of Košare was fought during the Kosovo war between the military forces of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on one side and the KLA... on the other. The battle was fought around Rasa Koshares on the border between FR Yugoslavia and Albania from 9 April until 10 June during the NATO bombing of FR Yugoslavia. The point of the attack from the Albanian side was a land invasion of Kosovo and the cutting off of the communications of the Yugoslav Army between the forces in Prizren and Djakovica. Another goal was the taking of the region of Metohija. After days of heavy fighting, the Yugoslav Army kept the Kosovo Liberation Army from advancing into Kosovo. KLA insurgents managed to take the Košare outpost following a massive artillery barrage by the Albanian Army and NATO bombardardment of strategic sites held by the Yugoslavs, but they failed to complete any of their strategic objectives and failed to drive the Yugoslav forces out of the area.
more

Cypriot intercommunal violence refers to periods of sectarian conflict between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots on the island of Cyprus from 1963... to 1974. In 1914, after the Ottoman Empire joined World War I on the side of the Central Powers, the island was annexed by the United Kingdom. Soon afterward, the UK offered the island to King Constantine I of Greece on condition that Greece join the war on the side of the British. Although the offer was supported by Greek Prime Minister Eleftherios Venizelos, it was rejected by the King, who wished to keep Greece out of the war. After the foundation of the Republic of Turkey in 1923, the new Turkish government formally recognized Britain's sovereignty over Cyprus. Greek Cypriots believed it their natural and historic right to unite the island with Greece , as many of the Aegean and Ionian islands had done following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. In 1931, riots broke out in Cyprus against the British administration. The British suppressed the riots, abolished the legislative council in Cyprus, and banned all political parties.
more

The Korean War was a war between the Republic of Korea and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea . The war was a result of the physical... division of Korea by an agreement of the victorious Allies at the conclusion of the Pacific War at the end of World War II. The Korean peninsula was ruled by Japan from 1910 until the end of World War II. Following the surrender of Japan in 1945, American administrators divided the peninsula along the 38th parallel, with United States troops occupying the southern part and Soviet troops occupying the northern part. The failure to hold free elections throughout the Korean Peninsula in 1948 deepened the division between the two sides; the North established a communist government, while the South established a capitalist one. The 38th parallel increasingly became a political border between the two Korean states. Although reunification negotiations continued in the months preceding the war, tension intensified. Cross-border skirmishes and raids at the 38th Parallel persisted.
more

Outpost Harry was a remote Korean War station located on a tiny hilltop in what was commonly referred to as the "Iron Triangle" on the Korean... Peninsula. This was an area approximately 60 miles north of Seoul and was the most direct route to the South Korean capital. More than 88,000 rounds of Chinese artillery fell on Outpost Harry. Since the outpost was defended each night by only a single company of American or Greek soldiers, the Chinese had anticipated an easy capture. Over a period of eight days, waves of Chinese forces moved into the outposts trench lines and totalling over 13,000 soldiers. Five UNC companies, four US and one Greek, took turns in defending the outpost. Most of the fighting occurred at night, under heavy mortar fire, while the daylight hours were usually spent by the UNC forces evacuating the dead and wounded, replacing the defending company, sending up resupplies and repairing the fortified positions. The daylight hours were punctuated with artillery, mortar and sniper fire, making repairs and reinforcement a more dangerous task.
more

The Western European Union was an international organisation tasked with implementing the Modified Treaty of Brussels , an amended version of the... original 1948 Treaty of Brussels. The WEU was established by seven Western European nations during the Cold War. Since the end of the Cold War, WEU tasks and institutions have been transferred to the Common Security and Defence Policy which is being framed for the geographically larger and more comprehensive European Union. This process was completed in 2009, when a solidarity clause between the member states of the European Union which was similar to the WEU's mutual defense clause, entered into force with the Treaty of Lisbon. The states party to the Modified Treaty of Brussels consequently decided to terminate that treaty on 31 March 2010, with all the remaining WEU's activities to be ceased within 15 months. On 30 June 2011 the WEU was officially declared defunct. The WEU was headquartered in Brussels, with a staff of 65 and an annual budget of €13.4 million.
more

The Zangger Committee, also known as the Nuclear Exporters Committee, sprang from Article III.2 of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear... Weapons which entered into force on March 5, 1970. Under the terms of Article III.2 International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards must be applied to nuclear exports. Between 1971 and 1974, a group of 15 nuclear supplier states held a series of informal meetings in Vienna chaired by Professor Claude Zangger of Switzerland. The group's objective was to reach a common understanding on: the definition of "equipment or material especially designed or prepared for the processing, use or production of special fissionable material;" and the conditions and procedures that would govern exports of such equipment or material in order to meet the obligations of Article III.2 on the basis of fair commercial competition. The group, which became known as the Zangger Committee, decided that it would be informal and that its decisions would not be legally binding upon its members.
more

The Southeast European Cooperative Initiative, or the SECI, has been an initiative that, under the auspices of men like Erhard Busek and Richard... Schifter, has been successful in providing stability in an unstable region and has found support in international organizations and countries. As of 2009, the region has found confidence in its new stability and along with the help of the SECI, has created a Regional Co-operation Council , owned and run by the countries in Southeast Europe aimed at strengthening peace, democracy and the economy in the hopes that the newfound stability can be supported by those countries who not so long ago were the perpetuators of volatility. The SECI Regional Center Headquarters is located in Bucharest Romania. The Southeast European Cooperative Initiative was formed in 1996 under the guidance of then, Senior Director for Eastern Europe in the United States National Security Council, Richard Schifter.
more

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is an international economic organisation of 34 countries founded in 1961 to... stimulate economic progress and world trade. It is a forum of countries committed to democracy and the market economy, providing a platform to compare policy experiences, seek answers to common problems, identify good practices, and co-ordinate domestic and international policies of its members. The OECD originated in 1948 as the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation , led by Robert Marjolin of France, to help administer the Marshall Plan for the reconstruction of Europe after World War II. Later, its membership was extended to non-European states. In 1961, it was reformed into the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development by the Convention on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Most OECD members are high-income economies with a "very high" Human Development Index and are regarded as developed countries. The OECD's headquarters are at the Château de la Muette in Paris, France.
more

The University of Piraeus is a university located in Piraeus, Greece with a total of nine academic departments focused mainly on economics, business... management and information technology. It is currently one of the leading academic institutions in the country. This institution is also home to The University of Piraeus Research Center which, since its founding in 1989, has participated in technological research on a national and international level, particularly in areas related to networking and internet technology. The university was founded in 1938 by the Industrialists and Tradesmen Association under the name "School for Industrial Studies" and its original aim was the advanced training of managerial executives. In 1945 it was renamed to "Higher School for Industrial Studies" while latter in 1958 it was again renamed as "Graduate School for Industrial Studies" and its seat was established in the area of Piraeus. Since then the university has evolved from its original sole focus on business management and added additional academic fields such us statistics and informatics.
more

The Technical University of Crete is a state university under the supervision of the Greek Ministry of Education and was founded in 1977 in Chania,... Crete. The first students were admitted in 1984. The campus is located on a panoramic site in the peninsula of Akrotiri and covers an area of 750 acres , 7 km Northeast of Chania. Library, cafeterias, and students' dormitories are located on campus. The Technical University of Crete ranks highly among the best Greek universities in terms of research productivity, research funding, scientific publications and citation per faculty member. In addition the departments of the Technical University of Crete are highly competitive. The students enter the University after scoring high scores in the National Examinations organized annually for this purpose by the Greek Government. The purpose of the institution is to conduct research, to provide under-graduate and graduate educational programs in modern engineering fields as well as to develop links with the Greek industry.
more

Arianna Huffington is a Greek-American author and syndicated columnist. She is best known as co-founder of the news website The Huffington Post. A... popular conservative commentator in the mid-1990s, she adopted more liberal political beliefs in the late 1990s. She is the ex-wife of former Republican congressman Michael Huffington. In 2003, she ran as an independent candidate for Governor in the California recall election. In 2009, Huffington was named as number 12 in Forbes' first-ever list of the Most Influential Women In Media. She has also moved up to number 42 in The Guardian's Top 100 in Media List. On February 7, 2011, AOL announced it would acquire The Huffington Post for US$315 million and make Huffington president and editor in chief of The Huffington Post Media Group, which will include The Huffington Post and existing AOL properties such as Engadget, AOL Music, Patch Media, and StyleList.
more

Kimila Ann "Kim" Basinger is an American actress, singer, and former fashion model. She is known for her portrayals of Domino Petachi, the Bond girl... in Never Say Never Again , and Vicki Vale, the female lead in Batman . Basinger received a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture nomination for her work in The Natural . She won an Academy Award, Golden Globe, and Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in L.A. Confidential . Basinger also acted in the movies 9½ Weeks and 8 Mile . Basinger was born in Athens, Georgia. Her father, Donald Wade Basinger, was a big band musician and loan manager who as a U.S. Army soldier landed in Normandy on D-Day . Her mother, Ann , was a model, an actress, and a swimmer who appeared in several Esther Williams films. The third of five children, she has two brothers, Mick and Skip, and two sisters, Ashley and Barbara. Basinger's ancestry includes German, Swedish, Irish and Native American, and she was raised a Methodist.
more

Apostolos Nikolaidis was a Greek singer whose career spanned four decades. He was born in Drama, Greece and grew up in Thessaloniki. He is best... known for being the first Greek artist to record or re-record the authentic, "prohibited" rebetika songs in the early 1970s with their original lyrics at a time when this type of music was censored in Greece due to the military junta of 1967–1974 in power. As a young child, Apostolos sang the popular songs he heard on the radio and whatever songs his mother, a seamstress, taught him. Although his affinity for singing was obvious from a very young age, upon completing grade school in 1951, he went to work with his father in construction, singing songs to himself or for anyone who would listen while picking up nails or carrying cement on construction sites. It was when Apostolos heard songs on the radio sung by Stelios Kazantzidis, a performer he admired greatly, that he realized his calling. Much to his parents' chagrin, he bought a guitar, formed a trio and started to sing around the neighborhood.
more

Antonis Remos , is a Greek laïko singer. Antonis Remos was born in Düsseldorf, West Germany. He was raised there by his Greek parents, and... later his family moved back to their native Thessaloniki, Greece, where he finished school. During his childhood he got involved with music and learned to play guitar by himself. He worked in multiple jobs, but finally, his singing earned him an income. After many appearances in Thessaloniki, in 1995 Antonis Remos had his first live appearance in Athens. He performed live next to famous artists, such as Dimitris Mitropanos, Stefanos Korkolis and Marios Tokas. This same year he signed his first contract with Sony Music Greece, planning to release his first album. The first album which was released in 1996 and was titled after his name, became platinum in a few months. In April 1998 his second album, Kairos Na Pame Parakato was released.
more

Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe.... Turkey is bordered by eight countries: Bulgaria to the northwest; Greece to the west; Georgia to the northeast; Armenia, Azerbaijan and Iran to the east; and Iraq and Syria to the southeast. The Mediterranean Sea and Cyprus are to the south; the Aegean Sea is to the west; and the Black Sea is to the north. The Sea of Marmara, the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles demarcate the boundary between East Thrace and Anatolia; they also separate Europe and Asia. Turkey is one of the six independent Turkic states. The vast majority of the population are Muslims. The country's official language is Turkish, whereas Kurdish and Zazaki languages are spoken by Kurds and Zazas, who constitute 18% of the population. Oghuz Turks began migrating into the area now called Turkey in the 11th century.
more

Albania is a country in Southeast Europe. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the... east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea to the west, and on the Ionian Sea to the southwest. It is less than 72 km from Italy, across the Strait of Otranto which links the Adriatic Sea to the Ionian Sea. Albania is a member of the UN, NATO, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, Council of Europe, World Trade Organisation, Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and one of the founding members of the Union for the Mediterranean. Albania has been a potential candidate for accession to the European Union since January 2003, and it formally applied for EU membership on 28 April 2009. Albania is a parliamentary democracy with a transition economy. The Albanian capital, Tirana, is home to approximately 600,000 of the country's 3,000,000 people.
more

Macedonia , officially the Republic of Macedonia , is a country located in the central Balkan peninsula in Southeast Europe. It is one of the... successor states of the former Yugoslavia, from which it declared independence in 1991. It became a member of the United Nations in 1993 but, as a result of a dispute with Greece over its name, it was admitted under the provisional reference of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, sometimes abbreviated as FYROM. A landlocked country, the Republic of Macedonia is bordered by Kosovo to the northwest, Serbia to the north, Bulgaria to the east, Greece to the south and Albania to the west. It constitutes approximately the northwestern half of the larger geographical region of Macedonia, which also comprises parts of Greece and Bulgaria. The country's capital is Skopje, with 506,926 inhabitants according to a 2002 census. Other cities include Bitola, Kumanovo, Prilep, Tetovo, Ohrid, Veles, Štip, Kočani, Gostivar and Strumica.
more