Gates of Vienna News Feed 6/5/2011

Protesters occupied the Ministry of Finance building in downtown Athens, took down the EU flag, prevented employees from entering, and called for a general strike. All this occurred just as the “troika” — the EU, the ECB, and the IMF — announced that Greece had met its austerity requirements and would receive the next €12 billion tranche of bailout loans. One of the criteria required of Greece was to change the definition of its “border areas” so as to allow more foreign purchase of real estate. In particular, some of the islands in the Aegean coast area were reclassified so that Turks could buy property there.

Meanwhile, Moody’s further downgraded its ratings for eight Greek banks.

In other news, bean sprouts are now considered to be the most likely source for the E. coli bacteria that caused the current outbreak in Europe, which has killed at least 22 people.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to 1389AD, AC, C. Cantoni, Fjordman, Insubria, Jewish Odysseus, Kitman, Steen, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.