President of the Hellenic Republic Prokopios Pavlopoulos on Saturday visited the port city of Patras, where he inaugurated the “Kostis Palamas Literary Centre” in the renovated house where the poet was born 159 years ago. In a speech during the ceremony, the president referred to Greece’s foreign policy issues and their role in the determining its relations with third countries and the European Union, while stressing that Greece’s borders and sovereignty were also those of the EU.
“These issues are also the benchmarks for measuring relations of friendship and good neighbourliness, as well as the European prospects of our neighbouring states, in the sense that all this depends, obviously, on a complete respect on their part of the following:
“Firstly, of the entirety of the sovereignty of the Republic of Cyprus, as a member-state of the European Union and of its inner core, the Eurozone;
“Secondly, of the entirety of international law and especially the Lausanne Treaty, which outlines exactly and with no grey zones the borders, territory and sovereignty of Greece and the EU;
“Thirdly, the status quo of the existing borders, which means, among others, avoiding the use of historically unsound names that, in addition, smack of irredentism that is completely contrary to the European acquis;
“Fourth, fundamental human rights, primarily the right of property and the rights of minorities.”
“These issues are also the benchmarks for measuring relations of friendship and good neighbourliness, as well as the European prospects of our neighbouring states, in the sense that all this depends, obviously, on a complete respect on their part of the following:
“Firstly, of the entirety of the sovereignty of the Republic of Cyprus, as a member-state of the European Union and of its inner core, the Eurozone;
“Secondly, of the entirety of international law and especially the Lausanne Treaty, which outlines exactly and with no grey zones the borders, territory and sovereignty of Greece and the EU;
“Thirdly, the status quo of the existing borders, which means, among others, avoiding the use of historically unsound names that, in addition, smack of irredentism that is completely contrary to the European acquis;
“Fourth, fundamental human rights, primarily the right of property and the rights of minorities.”