Seamen stranded in Greece hope Foreign Minister will end their misery

Foreign Minister Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz has intervened in the case of three Polish seamen who have been trapped in the Greek port of Astakos for ten months. Following his action, the Greek Foreign Ministry has promised to resolve the issue by August 15. Captain Iwo Wichert, electrician Jacek Betiuka and chief mechanic Tadeusz Fryc came to Greece in February 2002, but Greek immigration police refused to allow them to depart from Greece after their contracts expired. Astakos has no official border point which people can cross. The containers on which the seamen came to Greece, under a Cypriot flag cannot be sailed to another port because the ship lacks a full crew, but at the same time, due to the origin of the ship and the port, no one was allowed on board as it is seen as an extra-territorial area of Cyprus, subject to immigration control. Even after the merchant seamen were diagnosed with deep depression they were not allowed to leave the ship to be treated in a local hospital. (Gazeta Wyborcza, p. 7) P.W.