Below, in translation from the Greek, is Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias’s interview of Monday, 9 February, in the German magazine Spiegel.
SPIEGEL: In Greece an old regime was removed by a broad popular movement. Exactly as in the case of Kiev, a year ago, right?
N. KOTZIAS: In our case, through elections. Support for Syriza right now is at 70%. People call out to me every day on the street: ‘Nikos, stand fast. Don’t back down an inch.’ Politics has a lot to do with sentiment, especially in the East and in eastern countries. We forgot this in the European Union. Greece has the sense that it lost its self-respect. This has already changed, after the first week.
SPIEGEL: How should Europe have reacted to Russia’s annexation of Crimea?
N. KOTZIAS: The annexation of Crimea took place before I became Foreign Minister.
SPIEGEL: The so-called referendum was recognized by Syriza.
N. KOTZIAS: A referendum can be carried out only in accordance with a country’s constitution.
SPIEGEL: In other words, with the consent of the central government.
N. KOTZIAS: Precisely. This consent wasn’t there in Catalonia, while it was there in Scotland. The Scottish path would be the best for Crimea as well. In fact, Scottish expatriates were not allowed to vote, whereas foreigners residing in Scotland did have the right to vote. This is a progressive system. If a region wants to secede, the decision has to be taken by those who reside there, and not by those who hold IDs.
SPIEGEL: Did you say this to your Ukrainian counterpart?
N. KOTZIAS: Yes. He was the first colleague I met with, in Brussels, during my first trip after taking office. I told him that a federal structure for Ukraine would not favor Russia. As a democrat, one should not fear elections or democratic structures.
SPIEGEL: How should the EU exert influence over Russia?
N. KOTZIAS: Europe needs to decide whether it wants to incorporate Russia into its security architecture, or whether Russia is an enemy. Europe is presenting a very poor image to the peoples of the South when the last thirteen meetings of the Council of Ministers have concerned only memorandums, punishments and sanctions. We have lost a lot of time.
SPIEGEL: Sanctions to which you agreed, after hesitation.
N. KOTZIAS: The situation was different. On my first day at the Ministry, I read that there is a unanimous decision from the EU on Ukraine and Russia. We called the Commission. They said, there’s no problem, we’ll backdate your consent by one day. Obviously, the previous government allowed the Commission to act in this manner. I told them they couldn’t mean what they were saying. If I had accepted that, Greece would have lost its rights. Instead of apologizing, they started a campaign according to which we appeared to be pro-Russian and dependent on Russia. When our protest was the most important pro-European move Greece has made in the past ten years. We are a poor country, a small country in crisis, but an equal country. We are burdened by debt, but we are not without rights.
SPIEGEL: What role does your country want to play in foreign policy?
N. KOTZIAS: Greece is in the middle of a triangle. Ukraine is at the top, Libya is on the lower left, and on the lower right is the Middle East, at a distance of just 300 kilometers from us. All of these regions are destabilized. What would happen, for instance, if, under immense pressure on economic issues, Greece was destabilized as well? That would create a line from Russia, through Ukraine and the Balkans, to the Middle East and North Africa. A vast arc that could bring millions of migrants to Europe. Then the whole of Europe would be destabilized. What we are saying is, peace and justice in Ukraine are of equal importance with stability in Europe.
SPIEGEL: So, no further sanctions?
N. KOTZIAS: Sanctions, yes, if they are necessary, but within the framework of this stability. Every measure must serve the higher goal of stability and peace. If we give rein to our anger and our moral outrage, we will have a “nice” war in Europe. We have to bear in mind the feelings of the peoples involved, while at the same time maintaining our composure in our decisions.
SPIEGEL: As a Greek and a former communist, you are very close to the country …
N. KOTZIAS: A lot of nonsense has been written about that. I am an atheist, not
Christian Orthodox. And since Russia has existed, for 25 years now, I have visited it just twice. In foreign policy there is a tendency for the small to need to follow the big countries. When there is détente with Russia, we are expected to follow along, just as we are in the opposite case. We are an equal member of the EU. And we have an advantage compared to many others. We were not a colonial superpower. We have cultural history. This is recognized by China. As it is by India, which sees us – that is, Alexander the Great and his successors – as a factor in its creation. The same holds true for Russia. We want to be a bridge, but a bridge that has its foundations in the European Union.
SPIEGEL: Why did you invite the irredentist Russian propagandist Alexandr Dugin to the University of Piraeus in 2013?
N. KOTZIAS: He was one of Putin’s advisers and held one of the most prestigious chairs at Lomonosov Moscow State University. I teach international relations, and I regularly invite diplomats and professors. Dugin was noted to me by diplomats, and he was to speak at other universities, apart from the University of Piraeus. Dugin was very anti-American, very pro-German, a cross between Huntington and Fukuyama. I didn’t like him, we clashed, and I didn’t even accompany him to the exit.
SPIEGEL: But there is a photograph in which you are smiling next to one another.
N. KOTZIAS: That was later, when I met him at the exit and the students wanted to take a commemorative photograph. It was from this photograph that they concluded that I am in fact an extreme rightist.
SPIEGEL: A harsh accusation for someone who was on the Central Committee of the Communist Party.
N. KOTZIAS: During the dictatorship, as a member of the student leadership, I was brought before military courts twice. Were the people slinging mud at me now ever jailed for anti-fascist activities? This is a campaign aimed at jostling for a good starting position against the new government. And it’s not aimed just against me, but also against the impending negotiations.
SPIEGEL: It has been written that you studied in Eastern Europe …
N. KOTZIAS: … and that I have an East German accent when I speak German. What nonsense! Mr. Steinmeier and I found that we lived on the same street in Gissen.
SPIEGEL: As “an extremely clever guy who was popular with women,” as Sunday’s Frankfurter Allgemeine wrote about you.
N. KOTZIAS: That was said by Heinrich Brinkmann, who was a Sponti (leftists of the 1970s originating from the extra-parliamentary left of 1968).
SPIEGEL: Women swooned when you recited excerpts from Marx and Lenin.
N. KOTIAS: If that were true, Lenin would be more widely read. I was a person who had been court-martialed in Greece – of course, I wasn’t so heavy at the time, and there was some sympathy for a person who had fought actively against fascism.
SPIEGEL: And now your governmental partner, the Defence Minister, Mr. Kammenos, comes from exactly that right corner.
N. KOTZIAS: He belongs to the popular right, which has the same stance we do on the issue of the memorandum (the troika’s austerity policy). The previous government worked with the Popular Orthodox Rally (LA.O.S.) party: Orthodox, anti-Semitic and ultranationalist. Showing great hypocrisy, Europe said nothing about this. The LA.O.S. politician Makis Voridis was the leader of a fascist youth group, and he, in fact, became the conservatives’ Health Minister. Further back, he had written anti-Semitic texts. Why wasn’t anything written about that? Because he was a good ‘yes-man’ who said yes to the memorandums.
SPIEGEL: How do you stand on older texts, in which you defended the suppression of the “Solidarity” trade union?
N. KOTZIAS: I never threw stones, as another Foreign Minister did. In spite of this, there are those who believe I am the worst there is. I was on the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE). On the instructions of my party, I wrote things, e.g., about Poland, that were nonsense. That was 35 years ago. But who mentions that I published the works of Jürgen Habermas in Greece?
SPIEGEL: But you continue to support your position that Germany is the leader of Europe?
N. KOTZIAS: No. My first position: Germany reacted aggressively at certain points in its history. It was prompted to play the role of leader, despite not being ready to from an intellectual and cultural standpoint. Thus, it played this role with violence. This is also my effort to explain the phenomenon of Hitler. My second position describes Greece as a “debt colony” and Germany as a sovereign power that holds sway over Europe but has not yet developed cultural leadership. This remains a justifiable criticism that I can defend scientifically. In this, I am not comparing the Federal Republic of Germany with the Germany of the Second World War. Nazism, this industrialization of murder, cannot be compared to anything. Whoever compares it to anything – whether that be Israel or Mrs. Merkel – is not only committing a scientific error, but is also absolving the perpetrators of this murder.
February 9, 2015