• Downtown Athens was paralyzed once again on Friday when thousands of Greeks took to the streets to protest against the country’s newly announced package of austerity measures.

• In the UK, an estimated 270,000 members of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union will walk out today to begin a two-day strike over redundancy payments.

• Portugal’s public services–including schools, hospitals and customs–were disrupted Thursday by strike action called by unions to protest the government’s plan to freeze wages.

• In Pakistan, the workers of the National Programme for Improvement of Watercourses (NPIW) continued their protest and sit-in in front of Karachi Press Club on Friday, protesting against the Sindh government over delay in regularizing the services of employees.

• In Egypt, protesting workers from the Tanta Flax and Oils Company ended a 15-day sit-in last week after reaching a compromise with Manpower Ministry representative Wael Allam. They were offered a sum equivalent to two months’ salary and an early retirement package of LE40,000, which they accepted.

• Dutch gay rights groups have called for a halt to protests against a Catholic church southwest of Amsterdam after it said it would no longer seek to bar homosexuals from taking communion.

• Workers at a frozen pizza factory in Ireland have ended their hunger strike after making a deal with bosses over the sacking of three men.

• In the Philippines, Gabriela – the country’s foremost alliance of progressive women’s organizations -  has declared March 8, International Women’s Day, as a “day off” for Filipinas, to be spent out in the streets, marching, protesting and asserting their rights.

• In Evansville, Indiana, a crowd estimated at 5,000 strong poured onto the shoulder and parking lot of the Evansville plant, protesting Whirlpool’s decision to shut down and ship jobs to Mexico.

• Carrefour SA’s 116 stores in Belgium were closed Saturday because of a strike over planned job cuts, said a company spokesman who put the resulting sales loss at the company-owned outlets at 14 million euros ($19 million).

• Scores of Jordanian politicians and trade union members staged a sit-in at the Trade Unions Complex in Amman on Saturday to denounce Israel’s addition of two West Bank holy sites to a list of Jewish heritage centers.

• Syrian Catholic Archbishop Basile Georges Casmoussa of Mosul led over 1,000 Iraqi Catholics in a silent protest on February 28 to demand that the government act to put a stop to violence against Christians there.

• In Nepal, the 48-hour sit-in protest of the Civil Movement for Democracy and Peace (CMDP), which began from Thursday in front of the Constituent Assembly building, to urge political parties to draft the constitution within the given time frame, concluded on Saturday at 8 am.

• Several Cuban dissidents say they will refuse food in protest at the death earlier this week of a jailed government opponent. Orlando Zapata Tamayo died on Tuesday in a hospital in the capital Havana after a hunger strike of 85 days. His death triggered international protests and Cuban President Raul Castro issued an expression of regret.

• Three Chinese death-row inmates who say they were tortured into confessing to crimes they didn’t commit have staged a hunger strike to draw attention to their case.

• Thousands of adherents of the National Popular Resistance Front (FNRP) marched in the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa Feb. 25 to protest the slaying of civil resistance leaders under what they still consider to be the “de facto regime” of President Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo despite the change in government last month. The rally concluded in front of the National Congress building, where the march was blocked by a military cordon.

• Hundreds of Dutch activists have walked out of a Mass in protest at a Roman Catholic policy of denying communion to practising homosexuals.

• On Thursday, protesting Guatemalan teachers in Melchor de Mencos blocked the Melchor Bridge with their bodies to stop vehicular passage through the border between Guatemala and Belize. According to union president Zetina, who spoke on behalf of the teachers, they are demanding a 16% salary increase from their Government, in addition to proper renovation of school buildings.

• Thirty-eight Jamaican women — all of them asylum seekers, some of whom have lived in the UK for as long as 10 years — are on hunger strike in holding facilities in the United Kingdom, in protest of their imminent deportation to Jamaica.

• Tens of thousands of protesters calling themselves the Purple People took to the streets of Rome on the weekend in a sign of mounting opposition to the Prime Minister, Silvio Berlusconi. The group, Il Popolo Viola, wore purple sweaters and scarves, Berlusconi masks or striped prison dress to protest against what they say is the undermining of Italian democracy by Mr Berlusconi in his battle with the country’s legal system.

• The pilots’ union of Lufthansa began a 4-day strike today after a last-ditch effort at negotiations over pay and job security failed.

• In Thailand, truck operators will stage a stoppage on roads today in protest at alleged extortion by highway police, saying incidents have doubled since last year.

• Thousands of protesters in Ivory Coast call for the resignation of President Laurent Gbagbo as clashes with security forces leave an undisclosed number of people dead and wounded.

• All 600 detainees at a prison in Iraq’s southern city of Basra have gone on hunger strike to protest conditions that are “not fit for animals,” a local politician said on Friday.

• Strikes at French refineries looked likely to spread as Exxonmobil employees Friday were called to join a protest at oil giant Total that has shut down seven plants and raised fears of supply cuts.

• Greece faces a growing fuel shortage as a customs workers’ strike halts the flow of petrol into the country. Customs workers have extended their strike against wage freezes and bonus cuts until this Wednesday, when unions across Greece will hold a general strike that is set to bring the country to a standstill.

• Dozens of Egyptian women and human rights activists staged a protest last Thursday in Cairo against a recent decision that bars women from holding judicial positions.

• Last Wednesday, Kenyans marched to vent their anger at a coalition government slowly falling apart over graft allegations and its inability to further key reforms pledged two years ago.

• Last week, A group of lawyers from the Law and Democracy Platform, an Turkish NGO working to strengthen the rule of law while respecting democratic values, protested against the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) decision to strip prosecutors conducting a probe into jailed Erzincan Chief Prosecutor İlhan Cihaner of their special authorities.

A Minnie Mouse lookalike outside Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel striking with union local 681.

Eight Disneyland Hotel workers of UNITE HERE Local Union 11 in Anaheim, California, engaged in a week-long hunger strike to highlight their two-year dispute on health care and other labor issues with the Walt Disney Company.  The eight workers ended their hunger strike on Tuesday, as five more began fasting.

The workers want to keep the health plan that their union provides (paid for in lieu of pay raises), while Disney proposes deducting health care costs from workers’ wages. Disney maintains that their plan would cost $250 a month per family, while the union estimates $500.  Workers typically earn $11-13 an hour.

The Disney dispute mirrors an exacerbating national trend: Employment no longer guarantees satisfactory health care coverage.  Between 2001 and 2007, insurance premiums rose 78% while wages rose 19%. As health care costs rise, employers drop benefits, contributing to the number of uninsured Americans.

One in six full-time workers, or 21 million people, were uninsured for all 12 months of 2008.  Astoundingly, 45% of the nation’s 46 million uninsured actually worked full-time. And the percentage of Americans who receive health insurance through their employer has decreased from 64% in 2000 to 59% in 2008.

The Disney workers seem determined not to become another statistic.

• Thousands of civil servants have marched through Athens, the Greek capital, as they went on a 24-hour strike in protest against the government’s plans to freeze wages, gather more taxes and reform pensions. The action left flights grounded and many schools and government offices closed, while public hospitals were expected to only take emergency cases. A two-million-strong federation of unions will also start a general strike Feb. 24.

• Ikea offered Wednesday to meet with labor union leaders after strikes shut down several stores in France — but only if six workers end a sit-in at its Paris office first. Workers walked off the job starting Saturday in protest over pay.

• Disneyland hotel workers  began a water-only fast Tuesday to protest what they describe as life-threatening safety issues on the job.  To show support for workers fasting outside the Grand Californian, over 300 people marched in front of Disney’s Paradise Pier Hotel in Anaheim yesterday.

• In Iran, numerous opposition figures reported police harassment on Thursday, including the firing of tear gas and paint balls at protests in the capital Tehran.

• Also in Tehran, workers of Tohid Tunnel gathered in front of the entrance of the tunnel they work for in protest of unpaid salaries. The gathering resulted in the closure of the connections between north and south Chamran Freeway from Milad tower to the entrance of Tohid tunnel.

• Syracuse Peace Council members protested outside the Syracuse Air National Guard base on Tuesday against unmanned drones that are now being operated from the site.

• In Texas, dozens of prisoners have gone on a hunger strike at a Los Fresnos immigration jail in protest of inhumane conditions. It’s at least the third hunger strike at the Port Isabel Detention Center in less than a year.

• Tomorrow, citizens of Florida and Destin will have the opportunity to show their opposition to oil drilling off Florida’s coastline. Hands Across the Sand encourages Florida residents concerned with pending drilling legislation to gather on beaches at noon and hold hands forming lines in the sand against oil drilling in coastal waters.

• Thousands of Australians will let their tastebuds do the talking when they sit down later this month for “Vindaloo Against Violence”, a mass dining event to protest attacks against Indians.

• Police in Venezuela used tear gas, plastic bullets and water cannons to scatter hundreds of students protesting against the government Thursday, while President Hugo Chavez’s supporters celebrated the 18th anniversary of his failed coup as an army officer.

• Hundreds of London Underground maintenance workers went on the first of a series of 24-hour strikes Friday morning in protest over new roster arrangements. They will continue to cause disruptions at the same time every Sunday from February 14th until the dispute is resolved.

• Dozens of Yemeni journalists, civil-society activists and members of parliament protested on Friday in front of the attorney general’s office in Sana’a against increasing harassment of journalists.

• The entrance to Kaiser Permanente’s Moanalua clinic in Hawaii was briefly shut-down on Thursday when protesters from Local 5 staged a sit-in. Kaiser employees and Local 5 members came to rally for a new contract that they say won’t out-source union work.

• In Calcutta, senior citizens staged a hunger strike on Saturday to protest against the skyrocketing prices of essential commodities.

• In Pakistan, political and social organizations continued a country-wide strike and protest this weekend against the deadly blasts in Karachi.

• Cuban police harassed and briefly jailed some 35 political dissidents last week in the eastern city of Camaguey, a Cuban human rights group said Friday.

• On Saturday, hundreds of Bahrain Petroleum Company (Bapco) staff and their families staged a protest outside the company’s refinery in Ma’ameer over pay and working conditions.

• In Oslo, a thousand taxi drivers of Muslim background went on strike late Friday, early Saturday moring in protest of the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet.

• More than 200 overseas Filipino workers (OFW) in Saudi Arabia have stopped working since Saturday in protest of alleged unfair labor practices of their employer.

• On Saturday, some 6,000 people gathered at a rally in Tokyo calling for the withdrawal of U.S. Marine base stationed on the Japanese island of Okinawa.

• Russian police broke up anti-Kremlin protests in Moscow and St. Petersburg on Sunday, and detained more than 100 demonstrators, including several opposition leaders.

• More than 150 inmates at a prison in Spuz, outside Podgorica, Montenegro launched a hunger strike last Wednesday, claiming guards are abusing them. This is the second such protest in ten days.

• In India, 10,000 teachers from 35 central universities began a two-day strike last Thursday, demanding changes in the regulation on service conditions which seeks to link their promotion to output.

• Dozens of students at Little Miami High School in Cincinnati walked out of class Monday morning on the eve of a critical levy vote. The walkout was followed by a sit-in at the school.

• A large number of staff at Copenhagen’s Kastrup airport, including security personnel, walked off the job yesterday and attended union meetings in protest against plans to outsource two employee canteens. Other employees who have downed tools include baggage handlers, the fire department, cleaning crews, technicians and drivers.

• Immigrants held in a South Texas detention center have begun an indefinite hunger strike. Its the second mass hunger strike in a year. Some of the detainees say they’ll refuse to eat until they are released.

• The Sheikh Yassin coalition organized a protest outside the Egyptian embassy in Paris on Saturday, demanding that Egypt stop building an underground steel barrier on the border with the Gaza Strip.

• Palestinians took part in a protest in Gaza City yesterday, calling for the release of their loved ones imprisoned in Israeli jails.

The internationally praised Executive Orders signed by President Obama on his first day in office to close the illegal prison in Guantánamo missed its deadline last week.  But that was old news.  It was clear from early on that the closing of Guantánamo, as well as the ending of other Bush era policies in the “War on Terror,” were not going to be much more than a face-lift.   An Obama-appointed Task Force, led by the Justice Department, just finished a collaborative effort in re-reviewing (including the men at Guantánamo cleared for release by the Bush Administration’s standards) the cases of all the remaining men at Guantánamo.  What did they find?  The results are quite staggering and depressing and confirm the continue need for action, witness and pressure against torture and the condition that allow it to happen.

Of the 198 men (now 196 after two Algerian men were released on January 22, 2010) it was reported that “nearly 50 should be held indefinitely without trial under the laws of war,” according to The Washington Post. As Andy Worthington correctly notes, such indefinite detention is not only legally dubious, it “rubs salt in Guantánamo’s wounds” by announcing such findings on the anniversary of Obama’s missed deadline.  And yet, 110 men are cleared for release, many for the second time, but remain indefinitely detained as the question of where these men are “allowed” to go is resolved.  Repatriating or resettling these innocent men – letting these men go free – is difficult because the United States refuses to take any of them and is stringent in allowing men to return to the Middle East because of unsubstantiated claims of “recidivism.”  Succumbing to the fear-mongering, the U.S. Congress has barred the settling of innocent men from Guantánamo into the United States.  The vote, which passed the Senate 79-19, effectively tied Obama’s hands from making the simple gesture to primarily European nations that the United States is willing to clean up its own mess.

And that is why we continue to protest against torture and indefinite detention.  Waging Nonviolence (here, here, and here) reported some of the activities and civil resistance from Witness Against Torture’s Fast and Vigil for Justice, particularly the 42 women and men arrested at the U.S. Capitol last week mourning the deaths of the three “suicides.”  Most of those arrested spent close to 30 hours in jail, identifying themselves only by the name of a prisoner cleared for release.  After a fast from solid foods for a week and a half, it was a difficult experience for those who spent the day and a half in jail with little water to drink.  But we realize the 12-day, liquid only fast is a small, humble attempt to bring the human face of and suffering reality of the men in Guantánamo (and Bagram) to the United States.  The stories and poems that are related to us by the men in Guantánamo (and through their lawyers) draw us into their humanity in ways that only fasting can do.  Through our own experiences of suffering during the fast, albeit miniscule in comparison, our hearts and imaginations are cracked open and we are able to feel the tears and pains and sorrows and hope (the little there is left) of the men in Guantánamo.  Although we are kept many miles apart, with borders and walls and barbed wired and armed guards and land mines separating us, during moments of our fast, we are drawn into compassion for even those we are told are our enemies.  For some reason, and Gandhi certainly knew this, when you fast, the layers of judgment, fear, and violence are shed and you are able to love even the “worst of the worst.”

We fast because it makes us more human, makes them more human.  Dorothy Day, the co-founder of the Catholic Worker, often extolled the “weapons of the spirit, [the] denying of ourselves and taking up our crosses” as the foundation for radical social change.  Gandhi urged his followers to fast to reiterate the need to be nonviolent. We fast because it draws us deeper into nonviolence and emboldens us for public action and civil resistance. Throughout our 12-day fast, many of us expressed a deeper solidarity with the men at Guantánamo than we had experienced before. Only a handful from Witness Against Torture have traveled to Cuba to try to visit the prison. Very few of us have been able to share in dialogue and community with the men imprisoned there, as we are not lawyers.  We fast and protest because indefinite detention, torture and extraordinary rendition are always wrong.  We fast and protest because we want to live in a world not ruled by fear but by courage. And so, while our bodies may be weakened by the fast, our spirit and our resolve are strengthened to hold on, to keep fighting, to keep protesting because one day justice will flow like a mighty river and our brothers at Guantánamo will be welcomed at our table.

In Phoenix, more than 20,000 people marched on Saturday to protest the indiscriminate attacks and race-based raids conducted by Sheriff Joe Arpaio against residents of Maricopa County. (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

• On Sunday, more than 25,000 people took to streets in protest against the government’s labor policies when the Confederation of Turkish Labor Unions, or Türk-İş, staged a wide-ranging demonstration called “Democracy and Rights for Livelihood, Peace and Freedom.”

• A group of Greenpeace activists interrupted a speech by Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff in Vancouver on Friday when several protesters stood up and began chanting loudly against his stance on Canada’s oilsands.

• More than 7,000 workers at steel giant ArcelorMittal’s plant in Algeria will intensify a strike aimed at forcing the management to revamp the ageing El Hadjar complex. Workers went on strike on Tuesday to protest the planned closure of the coking plant, which employs 320 people.

• Worker blockades of the Belgian breweries of Anheuser-Busch InBev, which began after the world’s largest beer maker announced it planned to cut 263 jobs out of its 2,700 Belgian workforce, were set to continue into a second week after the collapse of mediated talks last Thursday.

• Monday marked the third day of a hunger strike by students demanding housing for homeless tsunami survivors in West Aceh district in Indonesia.

• Jordanian prisoners in Iraq, most of whom are university students, drivers and traders, have embarked on an open hunger strike to press for their release.

• Hundreds of Proshika employees in Bangladesh staged a sit-in in front of their head office for the fifth consecutive day on Saturday and also held a protest march against police barring them from entering the building in the city’s Mirpur.

• In India, leaders of all-party Joint Action Committee (JAC) of Telangana Saturday began a hunger strike to demand that the central government immediately initiate the process for formation of the state.

In a number of theology classes, we talked about the unity of all beings and things on the earth.  We are all interconnected.  As I have sat with this over the last few years, the more I have come to believe this (from a scientific, theological, and social perspective, etc.).  Today our group – Witness Against Torture – did a Ghost Walk in the Senate Hart office building.  A number of us walked in orange jumpsuits with names of prisoners who have been cleared for release on our backs.  We each walked separately on a different floor and wing in a very prayerful and solemn way.  We went to “lobby” those in the Senate to help remember these men who have been “cleared for release” and are ready to leave yet remain in Guantánamo.

We put the jumpsuits on once in the building and after about 20 minutes a police officer came running up to me (very out of breath) as I was walking at a Thich Nhat Hanh pace… very slowly and deliberately.  He respectfully asked how I was doing and what I was doing here.  Then he requested my ID, followed by a number of investigative questions.  We weren’t doing anything illegal in our action, but they were checking on us.  After I was allowed to continue walking, another person – from the capitol police – wanted to talk to me.  As I told him that I was with Witness Against Torture, that I was not protesting or demonstrating, that I was lobbying to help follow the executive order to close Guantánamo and end torture, and that we were completely nonviolent, he responded: “Oh, Witness Against Torture.  I know you guys.  I’ve seen you for a number of years.”  They let me (and our whole group) continue to walk.

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• Supporters of the German Pirate Party assembled in nearly naked groups at airports in Berlin, Frankfurt and Düsseldorf on Sunday afternoon to protest the controversial “naked” scanners planned for security checks.

• British Airways cabin crew are routinely pouring vintage wine served to First Class passengers down the sink to protest staff cuts and a two-year pay freeze.

• About 200 people gathered for the kickoff of an 11-day series of events in Washington DC om Monday to raise awareness about the Guantanamo situation. About 100 people nationwide will participate in a liquids-only fast, while others planned to join in prayer and reflection through Jan. 22, the one-year anniversary of Obama’s executive order.

• Nearly 100 auto workers and labor activists demonstrated in snowy, blustery conditions near the North American International Auto Show on Monday, calling for a federal jobs recovery bill, a national single-payer health system and a green industrial policy.

• Around 150-200 inmates at Stillwateter Correctional Facility in Minnesota refused to return to their cells after a meal on Sunday afternoon to protest the operational rules of the unit, such as the amount of time they are allowed out of their cells. After almost two hours they complied with orders to return to their cells peacefully.

• Dockworkers at France’s top container ports in Le Havre and Marseilles staged the second 24-hour strike in as many weeks to protest government reforms.

• Around 1500 children in the villages of India’s Gujarat’s Sanand block have stopped going to school to protest the Gujarat government’s plans to acquire their parents’ farmland for industrial purposes.

• About 500 striking Algerian workers blocked a main road near the capital on Thursday—the latest in a series of outbreaks of unrest over price inflation and living conditions. They were confronted with lines of riot police equipped with water cannons and armored vehicles.
  

• When the Olympic torch passed through Manitoba yesterday it was trailed by seven horses carrying leaders from native communities, who were drawing attention to the plight of missing and murdered aboriginal women in Canada.

• Over 800 members of UNITE HERE Local 2 and 400 supporters blocked the San Francisco Hilton’s main entrance for several hours to protest the hotel chain’s proposal to cut starting wages for new hires by 25 percent.  140 were arrested.

• About 5,000 demonstrators gathered yesterday in the city of Jalalabad in eastern Afghanistan to protest the deaths of children in an explosion on Wednesday that they blamed on U.S. forces.

• Five activists in Homestead Florida are fasting to protest the deportation of immigrants with families.

• Several thousand DeKalb County school employees dressed in black yesterday to protest the superintendent’s $15,000 raise, which comes after the board slashed their pay increases and implemented a one-day furlough.

• Fujitsu workers in east Manchester, Warrington, Bolton and Crewe are taking part in a 48-hour walkout as part of the UK’s first ever national IT sector strike to protest redundancies, pay and pensions.

Next week, on January 11, the 8th anniversary of the first prisoner arriving at Guantanamo, our friends at Witness Against Torture have organized a 12-day fast in DC to call on the Obama administration to uphold its promise to close the notorious prison and declare their opposition to the inmates continued indefinite detention (without charges or trial) in the US.

According to their press release:

Members of Witness Against Torture will rally in front of the White House at 11:45 a.m. to protest the lack of progress toward justice for detainees since Obama took office and demand from the administration true change. Speakers will announce a 12-Day Fast for Justice in Washington DC, ending on January 22– the Obama administration’s self-declared, and now-voided, deadline for closing Guantanamo.

[...]

After the demonstration, activists will stage a Guantanamo prisoner procession to the National Press Club. There, they will join the Center for Constitutional Rights for a press briefing featuring detainee lawyers and human rights activists. The briefing, led by CCR Executive Director Vince Warren, will include the reading of letters from released and exonerated Guantanamo detainees calling for the prison’s closure and justice for all detainees.

Many of us here at Waging Nonviolence have been involved in past actions organized by Witness Against Torture. They are a phenomenal group of activists, including many from the Catholic Worker movement, who know this issue inside and out. If you can make it to DC, I’m sure it will be a moving experience.

• Hundreds of activists with the Gaza Freedom March are staging continued demonstrations and sit-ins in Cairo to protest the Egyptian government’s refusal to allow them to cross the border into Gaza. Organizers say an offer by Egyptian authorities this morning to allow just 100 members of the group to go to Gaza was not sufficient.

• A ‘day of mourning’ was observed across Sindh on Tuesday, including a general strike in Hyperabad, in protest against the killing of over 40 people in a suicide attack on the central procession of Ashura in Karachi on Monday.

• The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) has called on consumers to boycott Coca-Cola for four hours a day in support of soft drink workers picketing in Pretoria. This follows a march by 700 Amalgamated Beverage Industries (ABI) workers, affiliated with the Food and Allied Worker’s Union (Fawu), at the company’s Pretoria plant on Tuesday following collapsed talks with management. 3,500 Fawu workers are already on strike, and may soon be joined by an additional 4,500 workers.

• Journalists in Mauritania held a protest on Monday in Nouakchott to call for the release of the jailed editor of a leading opposition website.

• Several Jordanian families began a hunger strike on Monday and said they would appeal to Amman’s governor through the Arab Organisation for Human Rights (AOHR) to erect a tent in front of the Iraqi embassy in Amman to call for the release of their family members who are imprisoned in Iraq.

• Iranian riot police fired tear gas in clashes with thousands of opposition supporters who shouted anti-government slogans during a Shiite mourning event on Saturday. On Sunday, at least 15 protesters were killed as the demonstrations, which at times turned violent, continued. 

• Students at several universities in Germany staged a campus sit-in over Christmas to protest the worsening of study conditions and rising fees.

• Members of two of Turkey’s largest unions started work after an hour-long delay Friday to protest layoffs and the closure of offices that resulted from privatization. They plan to continue holding one hour protests every week until the ruling party hears their demands.

• Palestinians have held a mass demonstration against Egypt’s construction of an underground wall along the border with the Gaza Strip which claimed its first victim on Friday.

• More than 200 workers organized a sit-in Thursday morning in front of the Social Affairs Center in Jabriya, Kuwait to protest the withholding of their salaries for more than seven months, bad housing conditions and not having their residency permits renewed.

• Rallies, hunger strikes and demonstrations continued for the fourth consecutive day on Saturday in the Telangana region of India, where the demand for a separate state keeps gaining momentum.

• Taxi drivers in the northern Greek city of Thessaloniki went on strike Saturday to protest the murder of a fellow taxi-driver in the region of Pylaia on Christmas Day.