Ambassador Statement to Media with Deputy Minister Karaoglou
Wednesday, August 26, 2020, 3:00 p.m.
Καλησπέρα, good afternoon, everybody. Let me first of all say thank you to the Minister for the very warm welcome. Also, congratulations on the completion of the first year of the new government, and also my congratulations for the smart approach that the government continues to take to confronting the biggest challenge that all of us face today, which is this global Coronavirus pandemic.
The Minister described all of the areas where we continue to see progress on U.S.-Greece relations, and I’m very excited to have Liz Lee as our new representative here in Thessaloniki, leading the charge to deepen and sustain those ties.
I also want to pay special attention to our support for the very important progress that we see in Greece’s relations with all of its northern neighbors. Everybody knows how much energy I have put into our relationship with Alexandroupoli, the port privatization and the FSRU, the IGB that was signed by Prime Minister Borissov and the Prime Minister just on Monday—none of that would be possible without the strong relationship with Bulgaria. Similarly, we see the excellent relations between Greece and North Macedonia, Albania, Serbia, all of your neighbors in the western Balkans, as a key contributor to regional stability and prosperity.
So we’re going to continue to work on all of these issues, and we’re going to look to Liz to lead the effort to help to continue to cultivate the economic ties that are such an important part of American strategy in this part of the globe. Ευχαριστώ πολύ.
