ATHENS: Greece will press its claim to a shadow puppet theater that UNESCO has deemed to be part of Turkey’s cultural heritage, the Foreign Ministry in Athens said on Wednesday.
The puppet theater features Karagz (“black-eyed” in Turkish), a hunchbacked trickster who tries to make a living by hoodwinking Turkish officials and generally avoids all manner of honest work.
The setting is loosely placed during the Ottoman rule of Greece, from the mid-15th to the early 19th century. The Greek version of the puppet theater features Karagiozis (Greek for Karagz).
Infused with a cast of Ottoman-era social cliches – including a Turkish enforcer, a Zante dandy, a Jew and a rough-hewn Greek shepherd – it was a popular form of folk entertainment in Greece until a few decades ago.
“The UNESCO convention on intangible cultural heritage enables neighboring countries to also access the same commodity,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Grigoris Delavekouras told a news briefing. “Greece has tabled a statement that the same practice exists in our country and a discussion … regarding this issue will take place in Nairobi in October.”
He added that the Karagiozis shadow theater is an “inseparable” part of Greek culture.
UNESCO last year placed Karagz on its list of intangible cultural elements, associating it with Turkey where the character was originally born.
In Greece, however, the character remains a powerful icon of resistance to authority even though Karagiozis performances are now only practiced by a few enthusiasts. Karagiozis is also a common byword for “fool” in Greek.
The origins of Turkish Karagz theater and its hide-crafted puppets are lost to history, though it is assumed that it was introduced to Turkey from Egypt.
Shadow theater is believed to have first surfaced in India over 2,000 years ago. –AFP, with The Daily Star
In the article, “and Moreover” penned by Matthew Parris and published in the 12 August 1991 issue of The Times the author accuses Greece of pirating Turkish culture and tourism and he says that Turkish culture and tourism is far superior to Greek. The complete article is given below:
Haluk Demirbag
Turkish Forum Great Britain
“……..and Moreover”
by Matthew Parris
Although I couldn’t be happier on holiday here, there is a problem
about Turkey. For the turist, it lacks what the PR people would call
“a corporate identity”. Japan is cherry blossoms and Mount Fuji, isn’t
it? Australia is Kangaroos and Sydney Opera House, Beirut is bombs. So
what is Turkey?
This matters. Countries, like cigarettes, are sold on broad
recognition. For mass-marketing, a nation needs an image. A tourist
concept is at best a fraction of the truth and at worst a complete lie,
but it is an important lie. Scotland has been sold for generations on a
powerful myth involving kilts, bagpipes and haggis, Israel is currently
running an embarassing campaign depicting the place as a sort of
all-inclusive pizza of New Testament holiness, happy Arabs and
skindiving off Eilat. I’m sure it sells.
Spain, starting with Carmen, offers us the marketing man’s model:
bullfights, cascanets… scant justice to the great spread of peoples
and landscapes that is realy Spain, but potent. The United States shows
that neither the country nor the image need be primitive for promotion
under the banner of a clear corporate identity.
And that is Turkey’s tragedy. There was a perfectly marketable and
attractive image available-and the Greeks nicked it. A small, relatively
unimportant country on the fringes of big, central, crucial Turkey has
grapped our attention and elbowed its giant neighbour to the margins.
It is one of the best sleights of hand in marketing history.
The whole thing has been done on the backs of ancient Greeks and their
ruddy Parthenon. But the modern Greeks have little connection with their
ancient ones and occupy a different territory, which does happen to
include Athens. Most of the best Greek ruins, let alone Roman ones, are
in Turkey.
So the classy handle to the Greek tourist package is fake. Now open
the package. Ouzo, figs and bouzouki music? Much more of all three in
Turkey, under different names, Idyllic Mediterranean coast, coves
and beaches? Infinitely more of both, and better, in Turkey. Sun-kissed
islands? Turkey has these too: and do you know where the Greek ones,
which are largely barren, get the produce they sell to tourists as
Greek food? White-washed houses with blue doors? Yoghurt? Kebabs?
Goat’s milk cheese? All Turkish. Turkish food is similar to, but nicer
than, the “Greek” food we love to eat in London, but find disappointing
in Greece. I could go on. The scale of the larcency by which Greece has
corralled for itself the tourist heritage of a whole section of the
Mediterranean is breathtaking. And they complain about the Elgin Marbles!
This is far worse: pirating of cultural copyright. And this, though
it dwarfs modern Greece, is only the the bottom-left-hand corner of
Turkey we are disscussing. I haven’t touched the Black sea or the regions
of central and eastern Turkey, about which we know next to nothing in
Britain.
I blame Mrs. Thatcher. There are to many marginal north London
constituencies with to many Greek Cypriot voters for Turkey to get
so much as a friendly mention in Parliament. There seems to be no
Turkish lobby in Britain. And now they are calling it “Greek” coffee!
It’ll be Greek Delight next, mark my words, before the Greeks go on
to claim little red fezzes and decorated slippers as theirs… oops
sorry, a friend tells me the slippers are already sold to tourists on
the Greek islands.
You probably think I’ve been got at by the Turkish Tourist Board.
Not so. I have simply been poked in the chest in too many barbers and
fish and chip shops by the sons and doughters of the Greek Cypriots
who shot at us through the Fifties before settling down to moan that
Britain and the world should protect them from the Turks.
The last straw came when, on finding that the best way to get here
was to fly to a neighbouring Greek island and take the ferry to the
Turkish mainland, where there is no airport, I was informed that
the Greeks would confiscate my air ticket if I tried to return the same
way. Are they afraid that tourists who visit Turkey will rumble the
Greek Tourist Board conspiracy?
If you have time to go to a Greek prison, you might try a test case
with the European Court. Meanwhile, here is a suggested slogan for the
Turkish Tourist Board: “Discover the real Greece. Come to Turkey.”
One Briton injured – 28 believed to be on flotilla
Israel: This was not a successful operation
Turkey accuses Israel of ‘state terrorism’
The United Nations Security Council today condemned Israel’s bloody commando raid on the Gaza flotilla and which left up to 19 dead and called for an impartial investigation into the incident.
In a statement released after a marathon 12-hour session, the body attacked ‘those acts’ which resulted in the loss of life.
But it stopped short of naming Israel outright, a move designed to placate the country’s closest ally the United States.
The statement, which called for ‘a prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation, is unlikely to assuage Turkey.
Ankara had used some of the harshest language against the Jewish state for launching the raid against the flotilla, which included a Turkish ferry on which the pro-Palestinian activists were killed.
Turkey’s Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, whose country drafted the initial presidential statement, called the Israeli raid ‘banditry and piracy’ on the high seas and ‘murder conducted by a state’.
The United Nations Security Council today condemned Israel’s bloody commando raid on the Gaza flotilla and which left up to 19 dead and called for an impartial investigation into the incident.
In a statement released after a marathon 12-hour session, the body attacked ‘those acts’ which resulted in the loss of life.
But it stopped short of naming Israel outright, a move designed to placate the country’s closest ally the United States.
The statement, which called for ‘a prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation, is unlikely to assuage Turkey.
Ankara had used some of the harshest language against the Jewish state for launching the raid against the flotilla, which included a Turkish ferry on which the pro-Palestinian activists were killed.
Turkey’s Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, whose country drafted the initial presidential statement, called the Israeli raid ‘banditry and piracy’ on the high seas and ‘murder conducted by a state’.
The United Nations Security Council today condemned Israel’s bloody commando raid on the Gaza flotilla and which left up to 19 dead and called for an impartial investigation into the incident.
In a statement released after a marathon 12-hour session, the body attacked ‘those acts’ which resulted in the loss of life.
But it stopped short of naming Israel outright, a move designed to placate the country’s closest ally the United States.
The statement, which called for ‘a prompt, impartial, credible and transparent investigation, is unlikely to assuage Turkey.
Ankara had used some of the harshest language against the Jewish state for launching the raid against the flotilla, which included a Turkish ferry on which the pro-Palestinian activists were killed.
Turkey’s Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, whose country drafted the initial presidential statement, called the Israeli raid ‘banditry and piracy’ on the high seas and ‘murder conducted by a state’.
The incident happened in international waters and worldwide condemnation of Israel was swift.
Former British ambassador to the UN Sir Jeremy Greenstock said there had been ‘immediate international rage’ following the ‘unnecessary loss of life’.
He said that Israel had to make sure weapons were not getting into Gaza ‘so some kind of defence is necessary but this was clearly not very well handled’.
Sir Jeremy added: ‘It’s past time by some years for serious international action to end the blockade and the virtual starvation of Gaza.
‘This is not going to work as a way of dealing with the Palestinian territories over the long term.
‘It’s not going to work, frankly, for a democratic and law-abiding nation such as Israel – it’s changing the character of Israel to be responsible for this kind of occupation for so long.
‘And to my mind, this situation is just not necessary as it stands at the moment.’
The All-Party Parliamentary Group on Conflict Issues said the flotilla raid had caused ‘indescribable pain” to the families of those killed and “provoked anger around the world’.
The three MPs co-chairing the group – Liberal Democrat Simon Hughes, Labour’s John McDonnell, and Conservative Gary Streeter – released a statement urging all sides to renounce violence.
They said: ‘As long as this long-running dispute remains unresolved, we fear that many more lives will be lost on all sides, resulting in even more pain and further deepening the hatred and distrust between all those involved.
‘Conflict resolution has been successfully used to end conflict in other parts of the world – now it’s time for the Israel-Palestine conflict to be resolved, for good.’
Turkey, from where most of the dead are said to come, accused Israel of ‘state terrorism’ and withdrew its ambassador to Tel Aviv.
Tens of thousands marched through Istanbul and attempted to storm the Israeli consulate, chanting: ‘ Murderous Israel, you will drown in the blood you shed.’
Deputy prime minister Bulent Arinc called Israel’s actions ‘piracy’ and cancelled three planned joint military exercises.
Foreign Secretary William Hague ‘deplored the loss of life’ and asked for access to the British involved, while David Cameron branded the attack ‘unacceptable’.
The deadly clash sparked a wave of furious condemnation of Israel – with 2,000 demonstrators outside the gates of Downing Street and thousands more outside the Israeli Embassy in West London.
In Paris, hundreds clashed with police near the Israeli Embassy. Police responded by firing tear gas.
The White House, which has close ties with both Israel and Turkey, expressed ‘deep regret at the loss of life in today’s incident, and concern for the wounded’.
Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu cancelled a trip to Washington planned for today to head home as the crisis erupted.
He expressed his ‘full backing’ for the military action.
Earlier, the UN said it was ‘shocked’ by the violence. Following a 90-minute open meeting, the Security Council went into closed-door consultations. Diplomats said envoys were haggling over the text of a proposed statement by the council, a task that dragged on into the evening.
Many council members criticized the Israeli action with varying degrees of vehemence, and said it was time for Israel’s three-year-old blockade of Hamas-controlled Gaza to be lifted.
‘This is tantamount to banditry and piracy,’ Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told the council. ‘It is murder conducted by a state.’
The Jewish state argues that the blockade, which began in 2007, is necessary to prevent arms reaching the Hamas-controlled enclave.
The high-profile aid mission – unofficially supported by Turkey – set off from Cyprus on Sunday, led by the Turkish passenger ferry the Mavi Marmara, with 500 people aboard and 10,000 tons of food, medicines and building materials.
There were two other passenger ships – one Irish and one Swedish – and three cargo ships thought to be all Turkish. After warnings from Israel to turn back, they were intercepted before dawn yesterday by three warships about 40 miles from Gaza, still within international waters.
Commandos launched their raid on the Marmara by helicopter, slipping down a rope to the top deck. Greta Berlin, a founder of the Free Gaza Movement and one of the organisers of the flotilla, claimed the marines fired indiscriminately at unarmed civilians.
‘We are all civilians,’ she said. ‘Every one of us is a civilian who is trying to break Israel’s blockade of one and a half million Palestinians.’
Audrey Bomse, another spokesman for the movement, told the BBC: ‘We were not going to pose any violent resistance.’
However the Israeli Defence Force posted a video on the internet site YouTube of footage taken from the helicopter which it claimed showed its soldiers being attacked as they landed.
Defence Minister Ehud Barak said the commandos had orders to use ‘minimum force’ to commandeer the vessels, and met only token resistance on the other five ships.
But he said the forces were ‘ambushed’ on the Mavi Marmara by protesters using ‘extreme violence’ with weapons including two pistols, knives and iron bars.
The commandeered ships were brought several hours later into the port of Ashdod, where passengers were given the option of being voluntarily deported or arrested and taken to Israeli prisons.
There was a communications blackout, with the surviving protesters’ satellite phones being confiscated, making it impossible to hear their version of events.
As I write this piece the scale of the Israeli lethal slaughter at sea is yet to be clear. However we already know that at around 4am Gaza time, hundreds of IDF commandos stormed the Free Gaza international humanitarian fleet. We learn from the Arab press that at least 16 peace activists have been murdered and more than 50 were injured. Once again it is devastatingly obvious that Israel is not trying to hide its true nature: an inhuman murderous collective fuelled by a psychosis and driven by paranoia.
For days the Israeli government prepared the Israeli society for the massacre at sea. It said that the Flotilla carried weapons, it had ‘terrorists’ on board. Only yesterday evening it occurred to me that this Israeli malicious media spin was there to prepare the Israeli public for a full scale Israeli deadly military operation in international waters. Make no mistake. If I knew exactly where Israel was heading and the possible consequences, the Israeli cabinet and military elite were fully aware of it all the way along. What happened yesterday wasn’t just a pirate terrorist attack. It was actually murder in broad day light even though it happened in the dark.
Yesterday at 10 pm I contacted Free Gaza and shared with them everything I knew. I obviously grasped that hundreds of peace activists most of them elders, had very little chance against the Israeli killing machine. I was praying all night for our brothers and sisters. At 5am GMT the news broke to the world. In international waters Israel raided an innocent international convoy of boats carrying cement, paper and medical aid to the besieged Gazans. The Israelis were using live ammunition murdering and injuring everything around them.
Today we will see demonstrations around the world, we will see many events mourning our dead. We may even see some of Israel’s friends ‘posturing’ against the slaughter. Clearly this is not enough.
The massacre that took place yesterday was a premeditated Israeli operation. Israel wanted blood because it believes that its ‘power of deterrence’ expands with the more dead it leaves behind. The Israeli decision to use hundreds of commando soldiers against civilians was taken by the Israeli cabinet together with the Israeli top military commanders. What we saw yesterday wasn’t just a failure on the ground. It was actually an institutional failure of a morbid society that a long time ago lost touch with humanity.
It is no secret that Palestinians are living in a siege for years. But it is now down to the nations to move on and mount the ultimate pressure on Israel and its citizens. Since the massacre yesterday was committed by a popular army that followed instructions given by a ‘democratically elected’ government, from now on, every Israeli should be considered as a suspicious war criminal unless proved different.
Considering the fact that Israel stormed naval vessels sailing under Irish, Turkish and Greek flags. Both NATO members and EU countries must immediately cease their relationships with Israel and close their airspace to Israeli airplanes.
Considering yesterday’s news about Israeli nuclear submarines being stationed in the Gulf, the world must react quickly and severely. Israel is now officially mad and deadly. The Jewish State is not just careless about human life, as we have been following the Israeli press campaign leading to the slaughter, Israel actually seeks pleasure in inflicting pain and devastation on others.
Istanbul-born economist Nouriel Roubini says the current turmoil in Greece would not have occurred if the European-Union member had looked east to Turkey and took copied its reform effort after the 2001 crisis. Speaking to businesspeople in Bursa, Roubini says Turkey’s membership in the EU will only strengthen the union and predicts a revival in membership talks
If Greece had followed Turkey’s lead in making financial reforms in 2000-2001, it would not be in such dire straits today, one of the world’s most prominent economists told Turkish business leaders Wednesday in Bursa.
Nouriel Roubini spoke at an event organized by the Automotive Industry Exporters Unions. The renowned economist, dubbed “Dr. Doom” because of his early prediction of the global financial crisis, addressed nearly 400 people, most of whom paid 350 euros to listen to him.
Evaluating the worst global recession since the 1930s, Roubini said when the United States economy sneezed, the world would generally catch a cold, in the latest crisis, however, it had come down with “pneumonia.”
“But the recent news is good,” Doğan news agency quoted him as saying. “The recovery has started. The debate is whether it will be a V-shaped, fast recovery, a U-shaped slow recovery or a W-shaped, double-dip recovery. My opinion is it will be a U-shaped process. This recovery will not be stable and steady.”
Touching on positive economic data coming from the U.S., Europe and Japan, Roubini said newly developing economies will recover faster than Turkey and economies in Asia. He predicted a gross domestic product growth of 3 percent for the U.S., 2 percent in the eurozone, 5 to 6 percent in Turkey and 9 percent in China this year.
“In the second half of the year, the growth rate might slow down in the U.S., dragging average annual growth down to around 2 percent,” he said.
Turkey and other developing markets derived the correct lessons from the 2001 crisis and engaged in structural reforms, Roubini said. “Meanwhile, developed economies [in the West] started to have problems.”
Reflecting on the importance of the U.S. economy in exiting the global crisis, Roubini said the stimulus policies implemented by governments worldwide are of crucial importance, as there will be trouble if they are implemented for too long or if they are curtailed too soon.
Drama in Greece
The reason the Greek drama engulfed eurozone economies is because “it did not implement structural reforms in time” and because of high budget deficits, the economist said.
“The crisis in Greece will create huge problems,” he said. “Some countries might leave the euro. A possible intervention by the International Monetary Fund would only postpone the problem, not solve it. This crisis is a crucial test for the eurozone. If Greece had followed Turkey’s post-2001 reforms, it would not be in this situation today.”
Turkey’s importance in the global economy will increase further, according to Roubini. “But Turkey should diversify in the trade sense,” he said. “It should orient toward new markets. Besides Europe, it should develop trade relations with the Middle East and Asia. These regions will post [remarkable] growth in the following period.”
Turkey is “moving on its path” by taking the necessary lessons from the past, Roubini said. “It is open to foreign investment. Its labor costs are relatively low. It could be a center for financial inflows from Europe to the Middle East. It may be a trade center between the east and the west. You have a strong workforce, but it needs training.”
Erdoğan’s suggestion ‘might not work’
Reflecting on Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s suggestion that every member company of the Turkish Union of Chambers and Commodities Exchanges employ one extra worker to overcome unemployment, Roubini said this “might not work.” What the government has to do instead is engage in “structural, fiscal and financial reforms,” he said, according to the daily Hürriyet.
Avustralya’da eski Labor milletvekilerinden Tayfun E. Eren dostumuzun hasmı ve Türk davasına 1999’dan beri aktif bir şekilde sürekli köstek olan Dollis ile ilgili arkaplan aşağıda… En son Assyrian “Genocide” ve Pontus konusunu planlayan ve yürürlüğe sokan kişi bu Dollis… 1999 dan evvel de Avusturalya meclisinde Yunanistan’ın ‘köstebek’ görevini yapıyordu. Şu anda Papandreou’nun danışmanlarından oluyor kendileri… Ve 1999’dan beri de Yunanistan’ın Dışişlerinde çalışıyor… İlgililerin dikkatine sunulur… Detaylı bilgi isteyenler Turkish Forum’a başvurabilirler…
Saygılar,
Tayfun E. Eren
Haluk Demirbag
—
George Papandreou faces early test after winning Greek elections
Peter Wilson, Europe correspondents
From:The Australian
October 05, 2009 1:57PM
Greek socialist party leader George Papandreou after being elected prime minister of Greece. Picture: Getty Images Source: The Australian
GREEK voters have thrown out their five-year-old conservative government and made centre-left leader George Papandreou prime minister, a post previously held by both his father and grandfather.
Mr Papandreou, a US-born former foreign minister, will follow his father Andreas and grandfather George in heading Greece’s government but he faces urgent economic challenges and a major battle to curb corruption.
AUDIO: Peter Wilson talks to George Papandreou
The PASOK socialist party that his father founded in 1974 is expected to win about 160 seats in the 300-seat parliament, reassuring markets by securing a stable majority at a time when urgent government reforms are needed.
Mr Papandreou pledged to “turn a page” on scandals and economic malaise associated with the outgoing conservative government.
“We stand here united before the great responsibility which we undertake,” Mr Papandreou told cheering supporters in central Athens when the result became clear.
“We have a mandate to turn a new page,” Mr Papandreou said as supporters of his Pasok party celebrated the socialists’ return to power after more than five years in opposition.
“Today we start together the great national effort of placing the country back on a course of revival, development and creation. We don’t have a day to waste.”
He said PASOK had waged “a good fight to bring back hope and smiles on Greeks’ faces … to change the country’s course into one of law, justice, solidarity, green development and progress”.
PASOK won by a larger than expected margin of 44per cent to 34per cent over the conservative New Democracy party.
Mr Papandreou, 57, told The Australian last week that if elected he would make several reforms to help members of the Greek diaspora in Australia and elsewhere, making it easier for them to work in Greece and to vote in Greek elections.
He said he would change Greece’s tough education rules so as to recognise three-year bachelor degrees issued by Australian universities as the equivalent of four-year Greek degrees, removing a hurdle that has long frustrated Australians wanting to work in Greece.
He also vowed to allow the one million-plus registered Greek voters who live overseas to vote by mail or at local consulates instead of the current system which requires them to travel to Greece to cast a ballot.
Often criticised in Greece for speaking English more fluently than Greek, Mr Papandreou has fought PASOK’s old-style party chieftains in a bid to modernise the party, dropping from its candidate list several factional heavies including the former prime minister Costas Simitis.
The defeated prime minister, Costas Karamanlis beat Mr Papandreou in elections in 2004 and 2007 but yesterday resigned the leadership of New Democracy to accept responsibility for his failed gamble of calling a snap election just half way into a four-year term of parliament.
Dora Bakoyannis, the 55-year-old foreign minister who served as mayor of Athens during the 2004 Olympic Games, is the frontrunner to replace him as leader of the conservative party, a post once held by her father Constantine Mitsotakis.
Mr Karamanlis had called for an austere series of government cuts to rein in the deficit and national debt but he was hampered by the fact that he had made little progress in the previous five years on his vows to fight corruption and reform an outdated government bureaucracy.
Mr Papandreou campaigned on a promise of a 3 billion Euro ($5b) stimulus package but faces immediate talks with Euro zone officials concerned that Greece’s budget deficit is already twice the 3 per cent of GDP allowed under the rules of the common currency.
The socialist leader has vowed to increase wages and pensions and fund the extra spending by increasing taxes on the rich and cracking down on tax evasion.
Raised in Sweden and the US when his father was in political exile, Mr Papandreou promised to appoint an advisory panel of foreign economic experts and tackle Greece’s high levels of corruption and its tradition of new governments handing out state jobs and contracts to their own cronies.
A senior job in the new administration is certain to go to close Papandreou advisor Demetri Dollis, a former Victorian Labor MP who served as deputy leader of the state opposition before being stripped of his ALP preselection by then leader Steve Bracks in 1999 for spending too much time overseas.
Mr Dollis held a high-level job in the foreign ministry when Mr Papandreou was foreign minister and has worked in Mr Papandreou’s personal office over the past five years.
, October 05, 2009
[2]
Papandreou looks to Greek diaspora as he forms new cabinet
George Papandreou is expected to tap international talent for his government to help tackle Greece’s multiple crises
Helena Smith in Athens
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 6 October 2009 10.50 BST
George Papandreou is expected to announce his cabinet later today. Photograph: Simela Pantzartzi/EPA
Greece‘s socialist leader George Papandreou was sworn in as prime minister this morning amid clear indications that the new government he will lead will seek to tap talent in the diaspora to address the multiple crises facing the country.
The English-speaking prime minister, propelled into office following an overwhelming victory in Sunday’s elections, is expected to announce a cabinet this afternoon to take on Greece’s financial and economic crisis and social malaise.
US-born Papandreou was educated in Sweden, England and Canada and is a Harvard University fellow. His closest aides include English-speaking Greeks born and brought up in Africa, America and Australia. The 57-year-old politician is himself more comfortable speaking English than Greek.
“Part of my identity is being a Greek of Greece and a Greek of the diaspora,” Papandreou told the Guardian. “I think in many ways being Greek is being ecumenical, open to the world. We are a country that has always been open with ideas and contact with the rest of the world as a shipping nation and tourist destination.”
Through his network of connections as head of Socialist International, the global grouping of leftwing parties, Papandreou has already embarked on talks with renowned experts in the fields of economy and public health. The Nobel economics laureate Joe Stiglitz is in touch with him “on a daily basis”, offering advice on how to rescue Greece’s debt-ridden economy from the brink of bankruptcy.
Also a Harvard professor and international health expert now sits in the Greek parliament following his appointment as a non-elected MP with Papandreou’s Pasok party.
“George has always said there is an untapped world and that is the other Greece in the diaspora that he is going to work with, talk to and take advice from to help us get the country out of this situation,” said Dimitris Dollis,a Greek Australian who is among Papandreou’s senior advisers. “Ties with the diaspora are going to be much stronger.”
Among candidates for prominent cabinet roles are George Papaconstantinou, a graduate of New York University and the London School of Economics who worked at the OECD in Paris, and Louka Katseli, a former economics professor at Yale.
After years of introspection under the outgoing centre-right government, Greece is also expected to become far more “open and outward looking” in its foreign policy under Papandreou, who won international plaudits back in the 90s when he almost single-handedly improved relations with Turkey by daring to pursue reconciliation.
“Being parochial is a state of mind and we want to get out of it,” said a source close to Papandreou who will be one of his senior foreign affairs advisers. “The [outgoing] conservatives chose to tread water in a turbulent sea, no initiatives were taken and relations with out neighbours gradually stalled. Our approach is going to be a lot more cosmopolitan, open and creative which is George’s natural inclination.”
The change in style has been welcomed by western diplomats startled by the rise of nationalism and xenophobia in Greece in recent years.
And amid speculation that Papandreou will assume responsibility for foreign affairs – at least initially – many are hopeful that relations with neighbouring Turkey, Macedonia and the rest of Europe will improve. In Istanbul and Ankara there were scenes of jubilation with some Turks cracking open bottles of champagne when news of Pasok’s victory came through. In recent months ties with Turkey have worsened with tensions in the Aegean rising noticeably.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2009/oct/06/george-papandreou-sworn-greek-pm, 6 October 2009
[3]
Greek NGO teacher Lerounis returns to Greece after release by Afghan Taliban militants
Greek teacher and NGO worker Athanassios Lerounis arrived in Athens on Saturday following his release earlier in the week by Afghan Taliban militants seven months after they kidnapped him in the Chitral region in northern Pakistan.
Lerounis, chairman of the non-governmental organisation Greek Volunteers, was kidnapped outside his museum in the remote Kalash valley last September, while his guard was fatally shot. He had been working on a cultural project in the area since 2001.
Professor Lerounis, a Greek teacher and social worker, was kidnapped on September 8, 2009 following an attack on the Kalash village of Brun, in Pakistan, where he lived. He was abducted outside the ethnological museum Kalash-Dur he had created himself in Pakistan to preserve and showcase the culture of the Kalash people. Lerounis has also founded two primary schools, three motherhood centers and the Kalash Cultural Center in Bumburate Valley.
Lerounis was released in Nooristan province in Afghanistan on Wednesday, and Pakistani officials took him to Chitral later that night. He was taken to the Greek embassy in Islamabad on Friday morning to await transportation back to Greece arranged by the Greek government.
A visibly moved and relieved Lerounis arrived Saturday at Athens’ ‘Eleftherios Venizelos’ International Airport, where he thanked everyone who had helped in securing his release.
“I am very happy to be standing on Greek ground after so many months. A big thank you to the people in Pakistan, the Greek government and the personal interest of the prime minister, who acted as a human being and not a politician,” Lerounis told waiting reporters.
Lerounis also thanked prime minister George Papandreou’s personal envoy to Islamabad, ambassador-at-large Dimitris Dollis, and the Greek ambassador in Islamabad Petros Mavroidis, who accompanied the NGO volunteer on his flight to Greece, as well as all people who were supportive throughout his ordeal.
Dollis confirmed a statement by Wazir on Thursday that no ransom was paid, adding that Lerounis’ release was a big success of the Greek government, Greek diplomacy and the country, and called Lerounis “an example of perseverance”.
Asked if he would return to the Kalash tribe, Lerounis said that “with the support of the Greek and Pakistani government, I would like to return there some day and continue my work”.
http://www.hri.org/news/greek/ana/2010/10-04-12.ana.html#10, 12 April 2010
