General News
Meropi Kyriacou Honored as TNH Educator of the Year
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
PARIS — French authorities defended police on Monday for indiscriminately firing tear gas and pepper spray at Liverpool supporters at the Champions League final, while blaming industrial levels of fraud that saw 30,000 to 40,000 people try to enter the Stade de France with fake tickets or none at all.
After a meeting into Saturday’s chaos, the ministers of the sport and the interior shifted responsibility onto the Liverpool fans while not providing details on how they were sure so many fake tickets were in circulation. People with legitimate tickets through Liverpool and UEFA reported struggling to access the stadium.
“There was massive fraud at an industrial level and an organization of fake tickets because of the pre-filtering by the Stade de France and the French Football Federation, 70% of the tickets were fake tickets coming into the Stade de France,” Interior minister Gérald Darmanin said. “Fifteen percent of fake tickets also were after the first filtering … more than 2,600 tickets were confirmed by UEFA as non-validated tickets even though they’d gone through the first filtering.
“A massive presence of these fake tickets of course was the issue why there were delays, three times the beginning of the match was delayed.”
The final, which Liverpool lost 1-0 to Real Madrid, kicked off 37 minutes late. Tear gas and pepper spray was targeted at Liverpool fans, impacting children — a tactic defended by Darmanin to prevent deaths.
“I’d like to thank the forces of law and order, also those who worked in the stadium because they were very calm and they were able to avoid drama and so thank you for organizing the pre-filtering but lifting it when there was too much pressure to avoid a drama,” Darmanin said. “That was a decision made by the prefecture to avoid any kind of deaths or seriously injured.”
French Sports minister Amélie Ouéda-Castéra blamed fans arriving at the stadium late for the crowd control issues, but did not say when they should have arrived at the stadium on the outskirts of Paris.
“We have seen, we have to improve in risky matches certain aspects with regard to managing the flows, first filtering, second filtering, and we have to make sure we look at electronic ticketing as closely as possible so we can avoid fraud as far as ticketing is concerned,” Ouéda-Castéra said. “That is something which is absolutely essential.”
There was no apology for the conduct by authorities.
“We are extremely sorry for all the people whose experience was wasted all that evening,” Ouéda-Castéra said. “For the people who had bought tickets and were unable to attend the match. That’s why we have asked UEFA to really work on a compensation system for those people — 2,700, including British people — so that they get compensation.”
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Hurricane Milton barreled into the Atlantic Ocean on Thursday after plowing across Florida as a Category 3 storm, pounding cities with ferocious winds and rain, whipping up a barrage of tornadoes and causing an unknown numbers of deaths.
BOSTON – On the morning of Thursday, October 10, Florida resembled a vast lake due to the terrible and fearsome passage of Hurricane Milton, which pounded the area for nine hours on Wednesday night, as described to Τhe National Herald by Father Stavros Akrotirianakis, presiding priest of St.
LONDON - Lee Carsley ran into the first problems of his tenure as England's interim coach after a bold team selection backfired in a 2-1 home loss to Greece in the Nations League on Thursday.
PITTSBURGH (AP) — Former President Barack Obama gave a blistering critique of his White House successor Donald Trump and urged Black men to show up for Kamala Harris as he campaigned in Pittsburgh on Thursday at the start of a swing-state tour for the Democratic ticket.
BEIRUT (AP) — Israeli airstrikes on central Beirut Thursday left two neighborhoods smoldering, killing 22 people and wounding dozens, Lebanon’s health ministry said, as well as further escalating Israel’s bloody conflict with Iran-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.