The Minister of National Defence Mr. Dimitris Avramopoulos attended yesterday the dinner hosted in his honour at the Headquarters of the American Jewish Committee (AJC) in New York. Immediately afterwards, Mr. Avramopoulos made the following statement:

“It was with great pleasure that I accepted the invitation extended by my good friend, the executive director of AJC Mr. David Harris, to attend today’s meeting, which is one more link in the chain of the relations between Greece and Israel, Greece and the United States, and also between the Greek American and the Israeli American communities.

In the past years, considerable steps have been made at the level of Greek-Israeli relations. In front of a new reality formed by the generalized financial crisis, peoples as ours come even closer, in the spirit of comprehension and mutual understanding.

At the same time, in our broader region, great and dramatic developments and whirls take place. A new geopolitical and geostrategic environment is being formed. Greece and Israel have proceeded to an important move, to a strategic cooperation covering a wide range of issues.

And this all started here twenty years ago, under the government of the ‘Nea Demokratia’ party, when Antonis Samaras was Minister of Foreign Affairs, and it was updated recently, with the signing of new agreements which show that Greece and Israel share a path, with development prospects, within a time of great challenges. As peoples, we are accustomed to facing and overcoming them.

In this meeting, I had the chance to exchange views with distinguished personalities of the American Jewish Committee, as well as with important actors of sectors such as economy, business and energy.

I intend to visit Washington once again at early May, responding to an official invitation for one of the greater and most important events of this year, participating to a mutual discussion with my fellow Ministers of Germany and Israel, and other eminent personalities. We shall open a series of issues pertaining to cooperation, understanding, coexistence and mutual prospect in a changing world.

I would like to thank David for his warm hospitality and I look forward to receiving him shortly in Greece”.