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All restaurants, bars and catering businesses will close from 00:00 until 07:00 in the region of Attica, the islands of the Saronic Gulf and the island of Kythira until August 24. Hardalias urged for the use of face masks to people returning home from holidays in highly burdened areas and recommended the use of face mask at all indoors facilities. when the necessary distance is not possible to be kept.

Greece's Finance Ministry is on red alert after the large spike in the primary budget deficit to 8.2 billion euros in July from 6.1 billion euros in June, making it more difficult to help support the economy and provide tax relief measures that are high on the government's agenda.

Following his one-day visit to Israel on Thursday where he met separately with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyaju and Israeli FM Gabi Ashkenazi, Dendias is scheduled to speak with several officials ahead of Friday's extraordinary online meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs Council.

Mitsotakis also stressed that Greece is also mobilizing its diplomacy, notifying friendly nations and alerting allies and partners. "We are not alone in this effort. The immediate response of the European Union to our request to convene the Foreign Affairs Council confirms that this is not purely an issue of Greek-Turkish relations. It concerns the relations of all of Europe with Turkey," he said.

The preliminary budget execution figures for the seven-month period showed a deficit of 2.086 billion euros in the general government balance. The primary result for the same seven-month period in 2019 was a surplus of 1.763 billion euros. Net revenue totaled 23.106 billion euros, down 17.7 pct from budget targets, while the total budget revenues amounted to 25.940 billion euros, down by 14.7 pct from target. Tax revenues totalled 22.678 billion euros, down 13.6 pct from target.

Five persons died in the floods that struck the island of Evia while two others are missing, announced Deputy Civil Protection and Crises Management Minister Nikos Hardalias after a meeting on Sunday at the town hall of Vasiliko. Among the victims are an 8-month-old infant and an elderly couple in the village of Politika while two other persons died in their attempt to escape the flood.

The greek minister said that The regime of the Greek islands is fully guaranteed according to the International Law and the Law of the Sea and of course it is an agreement that has totally fair characteristics, Gerapetritis said. Asked if the Greek side is expecting new provocations from Ankara, he said that "we are ready for all possibilities, there will be no holidays for us this year".

According to the data on salaried employment for July, new jobs reached 306,808, while job cuts reached 238,897 (87,824 came from voluntary resignations and 151,073 from the termination of open-ended contracts or the expiration of fixed-term contracts). The 67,911 jobs created are the best performance since July 2001, while last year the balance was negative with 14,691 fewer jobs.

In a joint press conference following the meeting, Soukry said that both sides had signed an agreement on the establishment of exclusive economic zones between Greece and Egypt and that all its provisions were compatible with international law.For his part, Dendias stressed that "after today's agreement, Turkey's illegal agreement with Tripoli has ended up where it belongs - in the trash basket."

By upgrading deputy Finance Minister Theodoros Skylakakis to Alternate Finance Minister in charge of EU funds, the Greek premier is hoping to quickly tap the 72-billion-euro package.