Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Evangelos Venizelos made the following statement after the emergency EU Foreign Affairs Council on the developments in Ukraine:
“The European response to the Ukraine issue is based on international law and on the need to safeguard stability and peace. Of course, the sanctions are a message conveying our resolve. But at the same time, the content of the sanctions is such that the political and diplomatic dialogue with Russia is kept open at the highest levels.
Because our goal cannot be a repetition of the Cold War; it cannot be Russia’s exiting the international community, because this is not the European Union’s strategic planning for the Eastern Neighbourhood and Ukraine in particular.
We want the country to be supported and to function in a smooth democratic manner, with a voice for all the forces, all the regions, all the ethnic and ethno-linguistic groups. We want to see Ukraine saved from economic disaster. But at the same time we want to find a political solution on Crimea that is acceptable to everyone, and we want to keep the crisis from spreading and to safeguard peace on the European continent
March 17, 2014