Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis met with the appointed president of Syria – and previously de facto leader – Ahmed al-Sharaa on Wednesday evening on the sidelines of the 80th UN General Assembly, a meeting that was not previously well “advertised”.
The meeting took place at the UN headquarters in Manhattan, with officials from both governments, including the respective foreign ministers, participating.
According to reports, at least in Greek media, Mitsotakis again reiterated Athens’ standing position that the rights of ethnic and religious minorities in Syria must be fully respected. He particularly emphasized the need to protect the Christian communities in the strife-plagued country, as well as respect for international law.
The latter statement was a thinly veiled reference to the delimitation of maritime zones, as an increasingly revisionist Turkey is pushing a unilateral interpretation of how far and wide its Exclusive Economic Zones extend. Ankara is a major backer of the new Syrian administration and its previous manifestation as an Islamist-jihadist rebel force, most notably the “al-Nursa Front”.
Mitsotakis also said Greece was ready to support the rebuilding of the Mideast country.
Greece, a predominately Eastern Orthodox country, sees itself as an unofficial custodian of the Orthodox Christian communities in the Middle East, as well as a supporter of increasingly embattled Christian Churches in the region.
Twenty people were killed and 63 injured in a terrorist attack on the Greek Orthodox Church of the Prophet Elias in the outskirts of Damascus last June, when a suicide bomber opened fire and set off an explosive device in the presence of 350 worshippers. The 8th century church – considered to be one of the most important fCor the Orthodox community in Damascus, a place of social gatherings on Sundays and religious festivities – suffered extensive damage.
In the early stages of the Syrian civil war, two Christian bishops, Yohanna Ibrahim of the Syriac Orthodox Church and Boulos Yazigi, of the Greek Orthodox Church, who were kidnapped on April 22, 2013, near Aleppo, while attempting to negotiate the release of two other kidnapped priests. Their driver was killed during the abduction.
To date, the two clergymen’s whereabouts and conditions remain unconfirmed and their fate is unknown.
