Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias made the following statement in response to a journalist’s question on today’s meeting of the Eurogroup:
“First, I have to say that I am very thankful to France, because they are helping us, in their way, for more understanding in the European Union.
Second, as I always say, when we are in negotiations, it doesn’t do any good to comment on the substance of the negotiations.
And third, my philosophy is a philosophy of historical optimism. It means that I’m sure that we will have a good agreement in Brussels. That is the wish of the Greek people. That is the wish of the Greek government.
And I think everybody has to understand that the Greek problem is not only a problem of Greece – it is a problem for the whole European Union. We are living in very worrying times. We have big destabilization on the borders between Ukraine and Russia. We have destabilization in Libya. We have destabilization in the Middle East. We call it the destabilized triangle: we are in the middle – we are the stabilizing point, and everybody has to help us, so that destabilization does not come to the whole of Europe”.
February 20, 2015