PM Mitsotakis on the powerful image of Greek & Turkish rescue teams pulling young girl

In an inteview on the devastating earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria that have so far claimed the lives of over 7,000 people, Mitsotakis said that the Greek and Turkish peoples are friends.

Asked to comment on speaking with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan by phone on Tuesday – after several months of diplomatic tension – to convey his condolences on Tuesday, Mitsotakis said that during such times of crises the fact remains that Greece and Türkiye are neighbors and should help each other. He referred to past help to each other during earthquakes, and said that both countries have to deal with similar crises like climate change and earthquakes.

“The Greek and Turkish peoples are friends. We may have our political differences, but at the end of the day we have nothing to fight about with the Turkish people,” he said. He also pointed out the video images of two rescuers, a Greek and a Turk, saving together a 7-year-old girl in Hatay, southwestern Türkiye. “These are very powerful images that, at the end of the day, build bridges between our peoples,” he underlined.

Mitsotakis also noted that the situation in Syria, where the earthquake also wreaked havoc, is even more complicated because there is fundamentally no official state representative, therefore help must go through international organizations. When the Special European Council meets on Thursday and Friday, he said, discussion will focus on a European coordination to ensure that the help sent will arrive wherever there is the greatest need.

The Greek PM said that any such help does not mean a particular regime is diplomatically recognized – the issue is to rescue people in horrific conditions who desperately need our help. There is no assurance that Syrian President Bashar Assad will allow the safe passage of such help, he said, in response to a question.

“No country is in the position to reach such resolutions by itself, that is why I believe it is important for these negotiations to be carried out through the United Nations or the European Union, a collective use of funding at European level. Such negotiations could not be safely carried out at bilateral level,” he pointed out. To the present, there is no communication with Damascus, he said, and the help Greece is providing is focused on Türkiye.