Alternate Minister of Foreign Affairs, Miltiadis Varvitsiotis spoke about tomorrow's meeting of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis with Russian President Putin in Sochi in an interview with SKAI 100.3 Radio Station and journalist Aris Portosalte, noting that its aim is to thaw Greek-Russian relations.
In particular, Mr. Varvitsiotis pointed out that the Greek Prime Minister is one of the few European leaders that Mr. Putin has received in Sochi and recalled that he was in Moscow last week as head of a Greek government delegation, signing the Protocol of Cooperation and several Agreements for the deepening of the economic cooperation between Greece and Russia".
The Alternate Minister noted that "tomorrow's meeting will hopefully mark this thawing, which, however, does not change the main features of Greek foreign policy", that is our membership in the EU and NATO. At the same time, Mr. Varvitsiotis underscored that the Russian Federation is a key factor in the European security architecture and that "what we want with Russia is to deepen economic cooperation, by strengthening bilateral trade and attracting investment so that the gap left by Russian countermeasures against European sanctions is filled".
Referring to the issue of energy, Mr. Varvitsiotis stressed that Russia is a reliable and the most important supplier of natural gas to our country. What we want, the Alternate Minister said, is firstly, this uninterrupted supply of gas to be continued and secondly, to be secured at lower prices.
December 7, 2021