In Cyprus, officials from Algeria to Iraq train to keep WMD from crossing their borders AP (November 4) From as far as Algeria, Iraq and Georgia, an assortment of senior government officials converge on this small facility for training by top U.S. experts to prevent the kinds of materials used to build weapons of mass destruction from crossing their borders. In just its third year of operation, the U.S.-funded Cyprus Centre for Land, Open Seas and Port Security (CYCLOPS) has far exceeded expectations. From the dozen courses that officials were initially hoping to hold annually, demand has skyrocketed, with scheduled training sessions for next year expected to surpass 50, says the center’s director Chrysilios Chrysiliou. read more
Greece mulls migrant facility on Rhodes to tackle rise in arrivals Reuters (November 5) Greece is considering setting up a migrant detention facility on the island of Rhodes in the eastern Mediterranean to tackle a rise in arrivals from neighbouring Turkey, Migration Minister Nikos Panagiotopoulos said on Tuesday. Hundreds of migrants have arrived on the islands of Rhodes and nearby Symi in recent months, local officials say. Images on local media has shown them setting up tents and sitting on cardboard boxes in Rhodes town centre, drawing criticism from local people. read more
Greek police arrest third suspect over bombing as minister warns of new generation of extremists AP News (November 4) Greek police arrested a third suspect Monday in connection with an explosion in central Athens last week that authorities have blamed on an alleged aspiring domestic extremist group. The 30-year-old woman surrendered to Greek authorities Monday at Athens International Airport after being located in Switzerland, authorities said. read more
Eighty years after thousands of Greek Jews were murdered, Thessaloniki’s Holocaust museum is finally set to open The Guardian (November 3) Few places are more representative of the horrors that befell Greece during Nazi occupation than the old railway station of Thessaloniki. It was here, in what is now a dusty building site on the outer edges of this northern city, that thousands of Greek Jews were loaded with brutal efficiency on to cattle trucks that took them to the gas chambers of Auschwitz. And it is here, on ground set aside for the construction of a long-awaited Holocaust museum, that Germany’s head of state, Frank–Walter Steinmeier, last week launched an emotionally fraught three-day visit, declaring: “Anyone who stands and speaks here as German president is filled with shame.” read more
Archaeologists uncover long-sought sanctuary of Poseidon near Samikon, Greece Archaeology News (November 4) Archaeologists from the Austrian Archaeological Institute and the Greek Ministry of Culture have made significant progress in their excavation of a large temple complex at Kleidi-Samikon in western Peloponnese, Greece. Originally discovered in 2022, the structure, identified as a temple likely dedicated to Poseidon, has proven to be more monumental than previously thought. The temple measures approximately 28 meters in length and nearly 9.5 meters in width, consisting of two main rooms, a vestibule, and possibly a rear hall, making it one of the most significant finds related to ancient Greek sanctuaries in recent years. read more
‘Transformative encounters’: Henry Moore seen through the prisms of Ancient Greece and Georgia O’Keeffe The Art Newspaper (November 4) A hundred years after the sculptor Henry Moore completed his studies at the Royal College of Art (RCA), in London, in 1924, and 47 years after Moore set up the foundation that bears his name, the Henry Moore Foundation has recently engaged in international loan exhibitions that examine the artist’s legacy and his global reception through the prisms of Ancient Greece and a fellow 20th-century game-changing artist, Georgia O’Keeffe. read more | 
