Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Monday met in Paris with UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay, during his working visit to the French capital.
The issue of the shocking reconversion of the Hagia Sophia and Chora Cathedral in Constantinople into a mosque was discussed, while the Greek premier also called for the international organization to continue efforts aimed at the repatriation of the Parthenon Marbles from the British Museum in London to Greece.
On Monday evening, Mitsotakis and French President Emmanuel Macron jointly inaugurated an exhibition at the Louvre entitled “Paris-Athens: The Birth of Modern Greece”.
In statement at the renowned museum alongside Emmanuel Macron, the Greek prime minister noted that “…truly these past 200 years depict the complicated history of the creation of the Greek nation-state, and the continuous struggle of people who considered themselves ‘guardians’ of one of the world’s most important ancient civilizations … they strived to maintain, along with the creation of a new country, the spirit of Orthodox Christianity, which kept Hellenism and the Greek spirit alive during the difficult years of Ottoman occupation.”