The Minister of National Defence Panos Kammenos, accompanied by the Chief of HAFGS Lieutenant General Christos Vaitsis, attended the celebration of the 100th anniversary since the contribution of Thasos to World War I, held on Thasos.
The Minister of National Defence stated, among other things:
“Brexit actually means that people have the possibility to decide about their future by themselves. Peoples do not accept any threats. Regardless of whether I agree or disagree with the result of the referendum we all must respect the opinion of peoples and their right to self-determination.
Beyond this, the second message is that results in democracies are not made by voters rather than by pollsters. This morning, I heard very carefully the statement of the president of one of UK’s top polling companies, who apologized and said that he feels embarrassed.
In Greece, pollsters not only do not feel embarrassed, but the University of Macedonia despite the difference of 20% that it had predicted for our referendum and with false figures in the last three elections, it is still being financed by the state and by SKAI television network. Polling companies should realize that this game is over and they cannot persuade anybody any more.
The third issue is the message sent to Europe and this message would be the same, no matter whether Brexit was winning or losing by 48% or 49%. The message is that Europe cannot be forced to be unified. Europe with a common culture, a common defence, can be united when European citizens will have been persuaded of it.
I am saying this, because here too, in Greece, we see people talking about European policy and European borders, but the residents of Agathonisi or Thasos see the national air space being violated and, at the same time, nearby allied vessels not reacting. They do not apply the European decision of 2008 according to which Greek borders are also European borders.
If we want united Europe, we must decide that we will be united in everything. We gave civilization to Europe. Greece was not treated with the required respect and over the last five years we have been going through a lot.
I hope that the message coming from the UK in yesterday’s referendum, is a message which will show that the only manner for a united Europe to exist is if all countries are treated equally, peoples’ decisions are respected and allies do not turn into creditors who blackmail.
Over the last year, the SYRIZA-INDEPENDENT HELLENES coalition government, the government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras proved that it is not us who want Europe to collapse, we are the ones who want cooperation yet we also want an equal treatment.
After the last agreement and the hard negotiations, Greece’s image among Europe has changed. It is time our creditors realized that they are primarily our allies and that the time has come to proceed to a debt restructuring which will relieve Greek people, will help things come back to normal and will help us respond to people’s demands of public goods of health and education.
From now on, I believe that it is time for growth. A new era begins when normal economic terms must be recovered, especially of for those who were inflicted by this five years’ crisis.
After the message of this referendum, everybody understands that dialogue and justice are those which can keep Europe united. And we will do anything for that.”
