Greek Civil Protection denies healthy protocol breach for Fenerbahce members / News - Basketnews.com

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Greek justice will conduct an investigation following a news article in the local press, stating that the head of Civil Protection Nikos Hardalias allowed four members of Fenerbahce Instanbul to enter the country last October, despite the fact that they had a high fever.The investigation was ordered today by the prosecutor's office on the occasion of the front page article of the newspaper "Efimerida ton Sintakton". According to the article, Nikos Hardalias, despite the restrictive measures in force, allowed four people of the Turkish basketball team with COVID symptoms to pass through airport control, two days before the Panathinaikos-Fenerbahce game for the EuroLeague regular season. In that game, the "Greens" prevailed by 82-68, however, five days later, one member of the Greek team tested positive for COVID and the whole squad was forced to be quarantined. Panathinaikos had to file a claim for the postponement of their games against Zenit and Promitheas Patras.

In the framework of the preliminary examination, the prosecutor will investigate the veracity and validity of the publication and whether prosecuted offenses have been committed. Hardalias responded with a lawsuit to the publication. In his statement, he asks that "the journalist who wrote the article and the newspaper editorial department provide the evidence she claims to have. I was never personally informed, nor did I inform the services of Civil Protection about four people, escorting the Fenerbahce basketball team, registering fever at the Athens airport," the Greek deputy minister responded.

"Fenerbahce team members arrived in Athens on 21 October 2020 with a special charter flight and all its members were taken to the designated reception area of the airport, where the relevant check of the documents required for their entry into the country was carried out in the prescribed procedure (PCR test taken 72 hours prior to arrival and PLF) and in accordance with the health protocols of EuroLeague and FIBA. The only involvement of the Greek Civil Protection concerns the approval of Panathinaikos's request to allow Fenerbahce into the country, due to the ban on flights from Turkey to Greece at that time," he concluded.

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