Dear colleagues
I welcome you all to Greece and to Athens, in my double capacity, not only as a Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister but also as a member of the Hellenic Parliament and this is my fundamental capacity.
I will start by stating the obvious: We are living in turbulent times, facing an unprecedented number of crises, particularly in the regions of Eastern Europe, the Middle East and the Eastern Mediterranean.
There is the crisis in Ukraine, where violation of the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity has brought strife and suffering to the Ukrainian people and strained the West’s, and NATO’s, relations with Russia.
The Greek government has a very clear and strong interest in the immediate stabilization of Ukraine. In Mariupol, where there is a large Greek Ukrainian community, we recently mourned several victims of Greek descent. And we firmly support the Ukrainian government and the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
We also believe that the crisis should be resolved through political and diplomatic means, thus rendering it imperative that open channels of communication be maintained with Russia, which instead of being part of the problem must be part of the solution.
And I look forward to Ukraine’s newly elected Parliament contributing effectively to the stabilization of the country and the full implementation of the Minsk ceasefire.
As partners in NATO, we must do everything in our power to avoid the creation of new dividing lines in Europe.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Among the greatest challenges we are currently facing is the crisis in Syria and Iraq, where the terrorist activities of ISIL are bringing unspeakable suffering to local populations and threatening to destabilize the whole region.
At the same time, ISIL stands as a global terrorist threat, due to the organization’s attracting large numbers of foreign fighters from around the world. We must deal effectively with this terrorist threat to international security, stemming the flow of foreign fighters into the conflict region, and blocking foreign fighter’s efforts to re-enter their societies of origin.
The barbaric actions of ISIL and other jihadist terrorist groups, including the systematic persecution of Christians and other religious and ethnic communities, have resulted in the displacement of many thousands of civilians who have fled from their homes.
This dire humanitarian situation and the resulting increased refugee pressure on countries of the region, including Greece, is a catastrophe that gravely concerns us and one that the international community needs to address with the utmost urgency.
Greece is of course participating in the international alliance against the ISIL and the jihadist threat, and we believe that, in this framework, it would be useful to capitalize, in parallel, on the Mediterranean Dialogue: NATO’s political dialogue with all of the states in the region.
The ongoing conflict in Afghanistan, too, has resulted in some 50,000 refugees seeking asylum in Greece, and this is in the past two year alone. This is indicative, I think, of the magnitude of Greece’s interest in the stabilization of Afghanistan and, to that end, the Alliance’s continued provision of assistance there.
And to the west, in North Africa, Tunisia’s successful parliamentary elections were carried out last week against the backdrop of the ongoing war in Libya, where we are also seeing a very worrying surge in support for jihadist terrorist groups.
Dear colleagues,
All of these crises only serve to make the Alliance’s role even more timely and vital. In the face of these multiple threats and crises, the Alliance’s resolve has never been more essential; its role and missions have never been more relevant, more imperative.
At the Wales Summit, we took very important decisions regarding the Readiness Action Plan, which contains elements that are designed to adapt the Alliance’s military strategic posture to “the challenges posed by Russia and their strategic implications,” as well as to “risks and threats emanating from our southern neighbourhood, the Middle East and North Africa.”
Greece strongly supports these decisions, noting that, in proceeding with the implementation of the R.A.P., we need to ensure that the components of the R.A.P. are militarily relevant, politically acceptable and sustainable from a resource perspective. And, as I said at the outset, we believe that the Readiness Action Plan should be implemented in tandem with efforts to improve the Alliance’s security environment through platforms like the Mediterranean Dialogue.
Dear colleagues,
Greece is one of the oldest members of the Alliance.
Despite the economic crisis, we earmark 2% of our GDP for defence spending. Our critical position at a geopolitical crossroads further increases our value to the alliance.
In our meeting here in Athens, just last week, the new Secretary General Stoltenberg noted Greece’s vital role in keeping all allies safe and keeping NATO strong, pointing to the important role we play in Kosovo, in our mission in Afghanistan, and in maintaining security in the Mediterranean region, particularly in operation Active Endeavor.
Greece, ladies and gentlemen, is a European, Balkan and Mediterranean naval power that traditionally serves and respects international law.
We are concerned at the recent violations of the exclusive economic zone and continental shelf of the Republic of Cyprus. Beyond violating the sovereignty and sovereign rights of a member state of the UN and the European Union – rights enshrined in international law and especially the International Law of the Sea – this flagrant violation of international law is creating yet another front, another crisis, in an already turbulent region, at a time when the Alliance and the international community are and must be focused on the very serious crises and security threats I outlined earlier.
As I have already made clear, we strongly support the Mediterranean Dialogue as a platform for building cooperation and security in the region. This is also the aim of the trilateral cooperation initiative we have embarked on with our Cypriot and Egyptian partners; cooperation that is aimed not only at trilateral synergies in a variety of sectors – energy, delimitation of maritime zones (in accordance with international law and the Law of the Sea), tourism, transport – but also at engendering cooperation in the wider region. Cooperation that will bring stability, security and prosperity to the peoples of the region.
And with regard to NATO-EU relations, Greece always looks constructively at any proposal that will facilitate their cooperation, while ensuring full autonomy of decision-making between the two organizations.
Dear colleagues,
Greece firmly supports the Euroatlantic integration of the Western Balkans and the Alliance’s Open Door policy.
But it is clear to us that each candidacy must be evaluated individually, based on the performance of each candidate country, and based on the criteria and the terms that have been set by the Alliance.
November 4, 2014