The founder of Greece’s first school for professional fishermen and an activist for cleaner seas and healthy fish stocks, Lefteris Arapakis, has been bestowed the honorary title of ambassador for the Mediterranean coast for 2021-22 by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).

Awarded in the context of UNEP’s Mediterranean Action Plan, Arapakis says the title is “a recognition of the team’s work and shows us that we are on the right path, doing something that is having an impact.”

“It is a recognition of all the professional fishermen and all our associates in the battle against marine pollution from plastic.”

At just 26 years of age, Arapakis became the founder of Greece’s first professional fishing school, Enaleia. The school trains, strengthens and motivates the local fishing community to collect plastics from the sea, allowing fish stocks and the ecosystem to recover.

In 2020, he was also named one of seven ‘Young Champions of the Earth’ by the United Nations.

READ MORE: Lefteris Arapakis: The Greek named the UN’s ‘Young Champion of the Earth’.

“It is a very important award, because it shows us that we are on the right path, that we are in the right direction for a more sustainable future,” Arapakis told The Greek Herald at the time of the award announcement.

“It is a recognition of the efforts of the whole team and the organisation. It also creates a very strong sense of responsibility. Now I feel we need to step up our efforts for a more sustainable planet, inspire more people and make a bigger impact.”

Pfizer’s Centre for Digital Innovation (CDI) and Centre for Business Operations and Services have opened new facilities in Thessaloniki.

Thessaloniki-born Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla opened the centres on Tuesday. 

“We have expanded our footprint by bringing our operations center here,” Bourla told the crowd.

“Our country has human capital and a knowledge-based economy.”

The centres will contribute €650 million to the local economy, employ 700 workers, and cover nine thousand square metres of land.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mistotakis told the crowd that it was a “very special moment” for the city on Tuesday. 

“More than 50 young people, 15% of the staff [hired by the centre], are Greeks returning for work after several years,” Mistotakis said. 

He added that the company’s expansion will “increase public wealth” in Thessaloniki. 

Mr Bourla first announced plans for the hubs in December 2020. 

Source: Ekathimerini 

The Civil Defense Ministry in Greece has sent emergency response personnel to assist Crete after a 6.3-magnitude earthquake hit the island’s southeastern coast on Tuesday.

Police, firefighters, and other responders are busy counting the damage of the second powerful earthquake to hit the island in just over two weeks. 

A small church in Xirokambos is reported to have collapsed and Sitia mayor George Zervakis says cracks have formed in the town hall building.

The quake prompted a “small tsunami” in the island’s south and widespread rockslides, triggering an evacuation alert. 

The Civil Defense Ministry says there are no reports of casualties or injuries on Crete and surrounding islands.

The Geodynamic Institute in Athens says the quake was felt as far away as Cyprus.

Crete has been rattled by numerous aftershocks since a 6.0-magnitude quake hit on 27 September. 

Experts say they don’t believe Tuesday’s tremors were related to the September quake which caused extensive damage, killed one person, injured scores, and left countless homeless.  

Source: Ekathimerini

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.3 on the Richter scale hit Crete on Tuesday afternoon, the National Observatory of Athens’ Geodynamic Institute has reported.

The tremor’s epicenter was located some 23 kilometers off the southeastern coast of the island, which is still recovering from an earthquake of 5.8 Richter in late September.

It struck at 12.24 p.m. and was felt across the broader region, rattling the islands of Kasos, Karpathos and Rhodes, and has been followed by a succession of aftershocks.

The fire service says there have been no reports of injuries so far.

Local media report that the church of Agios Nikolaos in Xirokampos, Sitia has collapsed due to the earthquake.

The seismic tremor was also felt in all the islands of the Dodecanese and mainly in Kasos, Karpathos and Rhodes, but also in Santorini.

Seismologist Efthymis Lekkas, who heads Greece’s Organization of Earthquake Planning and Protection (OASP), told state broadcaster ERT that Tuesday’s earthquake did not come from the same epicenter as that in Arkalochori, in the region of Iraklio, on September 27.

One person died in that earthquake and hundreds of homes and businesses were badly damaged.