Very, very brief introduction of Spiros Makris because I'm sure you know all about him.
Very famous for having coordinated the first cultural capital of Europe in Athens in 1985,
and I can't think of anywhere more appropriate to hold that.
He is now the honorary president of the Network of Cultural Capitals and cultural months of Europe.
He is also and at this point, I have to reveal a very deep secret, which is that he is not the only famous member of his family.
He is also a member of the board of directors of the Melina mercouri Foundation.
And and this is a project very close to my heart.
And I know to David Blackmon's as well. He played a major role in the rebirth of the Greek treasury.
Spiros is speaking on the general theme The Power of culture and the continuing influence of Melina mercouri.
I think [INAUDIBLE] probably elaborate the title slightly and beginning to speak.
The idea for this evening is that we start off with Spirit speaking.
We will then have a short film. I think the I hope that we can then at that stage of proceedings at about 615,
which will allow at least half an hour for questions and answers, and then I believe that we can prepare for a libation upstairs at 645.
So without further ado, Spiros, over to you.
Thank you, Sir David, for your kind words. And today's event has been mainly organised and funded by the Greek society.
I wish the sector were also known as the site is the director of Southeast European Studies and the Administration, Mr. Julia Adams.
I also wish to thank Sir David, my former British ambassador to Greece, who has kindly agreed to chair the door.
Melina had a many sided personality. She was an actress, resistance fighter and politician.
Melina loved Greece during her entire life.
She wished Greece to be honoured and respected.
As a little girl, she acted in front of the mirror of various heroes.
Her family was against her becoming an actress, especially her grandfather, Spiros,
but of course, was the mayor of Athens for 24 years and who Melina adored.
She secretly sat for the entrance exams to the Drama School of the National Theatre.
She succeeded and passed with flying colours.
She acted in 47 plays, including comedies, musical dramas and tragedies.
Melina performed the role of the Dare in the play by Euripides.
She showed Medea not like some vindictive and jealous woman, but like a proud woman scorned.
You Lepidus expressed prophetically the position of women in this tragedy.
Go back to the sources flow, the secretary avers.
The world and morality are turned upside down.
The hearts of men are treacherous.
The voice of time will change it. Derogatorily will written down the ages.
All mankind will be unmoored. No longer will in a sound.
Europe should be attached to ours. The film, directed by Yannis Oscar to take the leading role in his film Stella.
This film was a turning point in his life and the milestone of the Greek cinema.
Melina acted in 19 films with international success.
Most memorable as Stella. He almost died.
Farah took AP and never on Sunday at the Grant Film Festival in 1960s.
Melina was awarded the first prize for the film Never on Sunday in 1967.
Melina was performing on Broadway, the musical Elliot Daly.
She learned that the military coup had just taken place in Greece and that the colonels had established a dictatorship in the evening whilst acting.
She stopped the performance and addressed the audience thus.
Today, something terrible has happened in my country, Greece, where democracy was born.
A dictatorship has been established. Your government has some responsibility for this.
You are a democratic people and I am sure that you will help the return of democracy to Greece.
She said out and continue acting her role.
All the audience stood up and uploaded.
After a few days, a British journalist from the Evening Standard telephoned her at the crack of dawn and said.
Mr. Spartacus, the junta's minister of the Interior, has taken away your Greek nationality.
Molina replied. I was born Greek and I will die Greek, but of course was born a fascist, and he would die first.
The next day, all the international press, this incident as front page news at once.
Melina began her political campaign against the junta.
The decision was that as soon as she had finished her theatrical obligation, she would return to Europe.
Milena visited 14 countries during a campaign against the conference in Vienna.
She was greeted by the vice president of the Council of Europe, Bruno Bitterman, in West Berlin,
by Mayer Schultz in Sweden, by Prime Minister Landa, by the Minister of Education, all of Parliament.
In London, she addressed a huge crowd at Trafalgar Square in Paris.
She spoke at the municipality of this city in all the countries.
She was welcomed by politicians, famous artists, journalists, Greeks living abroad and by people everywhere.
In Genoa, a bomb was planted in the hole where she was due to speak.
Luckily, it was spotted just in time.
She was taken to the courtyard before it exploded.
People began to leave. Maybe not.
Went to the microphone and called. Where are you going?
I haven't told you what I want to say. And calmly, she began to speak.
Everyone cheered when he joined a fair rebellion, immediately returned to Greece.
The welcome she got from the people was tremendous.
She was a candidate for parliament, for Barrios. She was elected triumphantly and became Minister of Culture in 1981.
Her first act as minister was the village, the British Museum, which houses the Parthenon Marbles.
There she took the decision to begin an international campaign for the return of the Parthenon Marbles to Greece.
The Parthenon Marbles are a potent symbol of democracy and part of the Greek heritage and pride.
Melina made the Greek parliament internationally known.
UNESCO's voted and with a sweeping majority, adopted the resolution to return the Parthenon Marbles to Greece.
All opinion polls in Europe and especially Britain support the return.
After Melina's death,
the Melina mercouri Foundation and I continued her works and visions with the collaboration of the Ministry of Culture of Greece.
We organised an exhibition we titled The Unification of the Parthenon Marbles.
It cultural must. The exhibition has been shown at the Athens Concert Hall at your desk in Paris,
at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, and at the Storeyed Municipality of Frankfurt.
The exhibition shows with precision and exact detail the damage caused by Lord Elgin and his assistants.
Different colours are used to show which reliefs at the British Museum and which are and which are in Athens.
In this way one can see in what condition the sculptures of the Parthenon are in today.
It must be emphasised that we never intended to empty the museums of the world of Greek treasures and antiquities such as the Aphrodite of Milos,
the debut of some with Rose and others.
Melina recognised the need to build a new Acropolis museum with the latest technologies to display the Parthenon sculptures.
Now the museum is ready. The creation of the Museum of the Acropolis is a dream that has become a reality.
A dream which began with Melina and has been materialised by the State and Museum all those years.
It continues, and which is a fitting home to display this unique collection of unsurpassed beauty and value.
Melina's thoughts for the creating of the Museum of Acropolis included the transformation of the area,
and thus she began an important plan for the unification of the archaeological sites of Athens.
A full kilometre walk will join the Academy of Plato with Panathenaic Stadium.
With the creation of the unification of the archaeological sites,
an important archaeological but of the Athenian landscape is now in the process of change.
Millions believed in cultural decentralisation and social organise in 16 towns of Greece.
Local municipal theatres, which have become the centre of the towns, are the focal point of art and culture.
Milena ask herself why, when she was a child, she was such a bad pupil.
In the end she realised that the lessons in class simply were not interesting to her.
The reason being that the teacher did not have a way to communicate with the pupil and make the class and lessons interesting.
She decided to create a programme which she called Melina Education Culture, which was integrated experimentally in 182 schools.
The aim was to change the way of teaching so that there would be a better contact and communication between teacher and pupil.
The greatest achievement of Milena as a minister of culture was to put on the lips of the foreigners the word Greece.
And on the lips of the Greeks. The word culture.
But what is culture and civilisation?
There are many definitions of culture, but let's say the most simple one.
Speech.
But in literature, theatre, music, dance, fine arts, architecture, science and care of the environment are expressions of culture that create culture.
However, the meaning of culture is much wider and deeper.
Civilisation are formed by what man has said or done since thousands of years ago,
in which up to now have been accepted and absorbed by societies and peoples and have been added to in the traditions,
habits, thoughts, creations, actions and memories.
Culture absorbed from the past, moulds the present and shapes the future.
Culture exists in all our doings, in all our activities.
It is knowledge, education, behaviour, freedom of expression, constructive dialogue and responsibility,
understanding and respect for the diversity and the opinion of others.
It is creation, quality and their way of life.
Geography and climate have always played a crucial role in the development of culture and civilisations.
The characteristics of the Greek natural environment for the Greek character.
Rick Light. Inspiration. Imagination.
Sharp mind. Inventiveness. Creation.
Joy of life. Storm. Hard work.
Tough life. Tragedy. Endurance.
Survival. See the journey.
Adventure. Communication. Trade. Exchange of ideas.
Experience. World wide knowledge.
Know thyself. Golden mean cultivation of mind and body well-being.
Freedom of expression. The power, wealth, clarity and flexibility of this Greek language created the Greek anthropocentric culture.
When my leader became Minister of Culture in 1981, the first thing she asked was When would you meet with other parts of the European community?
The European community, a commercial and economic community up to that point had not given special attention to its cultural dimension.
And cultural ministers met informally.
Melina mercouri Got it. All the community culture ministers together in order to submit to them the following question How
is it possible for a community which is deprived of its cultural dimension to grow and continued?
Our role as ministers of culture is clear our responsibility and must.
Culture is the soul of society. Therefore, our foremost duty is to look at the foundations and nature of this community.
This does not mean that we should impose our ideas.
On the contrary, we must recognise the diversity of the differences amongst the people of Europe.
The determining factor of a European identity lies precisely in respecting this
diversity with the aim of creating a dialogue between the cultures of Europe.
It is time for our voice to be heard as loud as that of the technocrats.
Culture, art and creativity are not less important than technology, commerce and the economy.
Marina proposed to the Ministry of Culture to designate this year a European city as European cultural capital.
The proposal was unanimously accepted. The institution of European cultural capitals was created,
with Athens being chosen as the first European cultural capital for the 1985 Million US initiative in 1983,
to said each year a European city as cultural capital of Europe had no significance because she made culture and then sensual.
[INAUDIBLE] it every day community life.
Melina and her sisters were especially anxious that the event of European cultural capitals should not be a festival,
but a meeting place for discussion, exchange of ideas and communication where artists, intellectuals,
insiders would bring their work and efforts together towards the promotion of European thought.
To be a tool which would allow the citizens of Europe to be more than mere spectators to participate, to understand,
to see, to define and shape new ideas and relationships in the process for a politically unified Europe.
As a result, the network of European cultural capitals was formed to link former current and future European capitals of culture.
Its aim was to serve the institution of European capitals, of culture, and thereby deepen the understanding of Europe's cultural diversity.
The network organised European projects and kept the records of all cultural capitals.
But what are the conditions we live in today?
During the last decades,
politics have been trumped and forced into a speculative logistic economy and so have lost the distinctive way and orientation.
The economic crisis has pushed Europe into a negative downward economic spiral, not felt since World War Two.
Today, the institutions of Europe in the European Union are under challenge.
There is a crisis in the very idea of Europe.
Not just economic, but also political.
The crisis can be explained, by the way, in which the idea of Europe has been betrayed and as the word Europe has for many people,
stopped, meaning no shared home and cultural space.
Europe, with economic measures it has imposed, has come to be seen by many Europeans as a threat to themselves.
The reason is that this economic ideology takes no account of what should be the focus of every economic ideology,
which is human beings and the full range of social, cultural and psychological needs.
Europe is first and foremost officially a civilisation that exists in a single
cultural geographic space and which has existed that space for thousands of years.
Greeks are the first of all of Europe.
Art, philosophy, education and democracy.
Throughout history, Europeans have been aware that they share similar values which reflect the reality that they all belong to one civilisation.
This, of course, is not to deny that Europe is a civilisation of many different nations and people, each with their language and history,
their own specific characteristic and their own achievement of which each has their right to be proud.
Any European construction has to take the account of this rich diversity, which is just shows of strength and not of weakness.
To deny however that done Shakespeare good and Voltaire were Europeans at the same time as there were Italian, English, German and French.
Is to deny the truth. To admit this truth is also to recognise that Europe's true foundation and truth centre is the cultural achievement.
That produced the likes of Dante, Shakespeare and Voltaire.
In not economic systems Germany, the arts Europe pianist who since 1946 had a replanning of France, envisioned a United States of Europe, Monnet said.
Europe will not be built all at once as a complete structure,
but will emerge slowly from great achievement, creating a solidarity between member states.
And he declared that he would begin with culture as the foundation of European integration.
Today, developed countries of the world form a global village.
Never in the history of mankind has that ever existed such easy contact.
Each country in its continent is in constant communication.
But it is doubtful if such communication promotes a straightforward and constructive dialogue between peoples and civilisations.
Hostility and excessive competitiveness breed conflict and aggravation.
Religious fanaticism, nationalism and Russia's are spreading.
The problems of the minorities are growing and employment is on the rise.
Wars and local rebellions are on the increase and without an end in sight.
We live in a time that is dominated by cynicism, mistrust, insecurity, corruption, fear, terror, and in the pursuit of money.
Grown ups engages the characters of people.
Milton Friedman, the renowned economist and a member of a group of like minded economists who called
themselves the Chicago School was a believer in extreme economic new liberalism,
which was introduced in the socio economic life in the United States, in Europe.
This school played a beauty role in Pinochet's dictatorship in Chile and Suharto in Indonesia as well as in other countries,
and was influential in the corruption imposed on Russia during the time of.
This Chicago school economist believe that the international central banks should be the ultimate dominant power
without interference from the elected members of Parliament who represent the political parties and the people.
Milton Friedman often used to say jokingly that if it was in his hands, the central banks would rely totally on economic science,
meaning that giant computers would be in total control without the humans supervision.
This is no longer a joke.
The hard truth be that this is what is gradually happening.
These theories.
They were run by Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, and especially George Bush, junior Vice President Dick Cheney, and the third secretary,
Donald Rumsfeld, resulted in the disastrous war and tragedy of Iraq and have led into the ensuing turmoil of the Middle East.
In Europe, Merkel, Schauble and Sarkozy have continued with this policy with unfortunate results.
It is a misconception and perhaps even a deliberate mistreatment to infer that the present economic crisis originated in Greece.
The crisis has come about from an obsessive Western European policy to support and
promote the monetarist economic system which protects the security of the money market.
Unfortunately, with today's political, economic and social relations,
the transnational capital, which is in the September, controls it checks the world economy.
It has formed an invisible pyramid of money that arranges the economic bodies.
The rating agencies Fitch, Moody's and Standard Poor's have become the arbiters of the economy of the Western world.
Nominal nominal money has become a productive, integral object of speculation, and so creates an enormous social and economic gap between people.
The policies of these centres, of economic powers.
This is serious and dangerous.
The gap must be narrowed. The geographic soullessness and the statistical account method of the economy are unacceptable.
They maintain a uniform culture which flattens everything.
Every spiritual quest in the joy of life have been pushed aside.
Can you? We stole it. You. No.
You can't wear suits like this. Cadillac is Louise's, Haku, Savopoulos and so many others.
This is true not only in Greece, but also in France, Italy, Britain, Germany, America, throughout the Western world.
We are here, but a part on the Beatles, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Sinatra.
Instead, we have the mediocrity of the Eurovision Song Contest.
In biology, literature or theatre. What is the latest stuff there is because it is smart.
Simone de Beauvoir. Albert Camus. Arthur Miller.
Albie Peter Hall. Peter Brook Brecht.
Günter Grass. All these and many others made us think, live, have concern, feel and love.
I am not saying that there are no events and performances in numbers.
Many but few exist. Quality, depth and inspiration.
Greece has been used as a guinea pig. Harsh measures have followed one after the other.
There has been no constructive plan. A potential development for growth does not exist.
All of this has exhausted the social stamina of the people.
Now it is has been given an opportunity.
The people of Europe are rebelling and protesting against the system, which is too harsh.
It took half the French presidential victory over.
Hollande has given a sense of hope and optimism for a change in direction.
In the last elections in Germany, states such as North Rhine-Westphalia are reversing Merkel's Polish.
At long last, there is a glimmer of change for a more favourable climate.
If those in Greece who signed the memorandum and those who resisted it were able
to join together in the common aim of finding a way to re-examine the memorandum,
it could be a victory for Greece and for Europe.
Unfortunately, a government has not yet been formed.
We are going to do elections, but I am sure that will be seven June elections.
Greece will have a government. Would Visnic, as many believe and support is a new Marshall Plan to reconstruct the administrative infrastructure,
to regain credibility and to immediately launch a program for the development.
Greece needs a bold new approach for funding and a new way of thinking.
It does not forget that Germany, with the Marshall Plan,
was awarded a huge benevolent economic assistance for the construction industry and education and development.
The truth is that today's Europe, with its stifling economic policy,
is not sensitive and it has not a feeling of conscious solidarity for member states but people.
It was wonderful, encouraging to see people in Europe,
America and Australia waving banners with the motto We are all Greeks and thus declaring the solidarity and support for us.
This slogan emphasises the certainty that without Greece there can be no true Europe.
For Greece is the cradle of European civilisation.
Also, it was a way of showing the fear that this European policy then forced us all into the same boat in which Greece finds herself in at present.
We must finally understand what when there is an increase in material goods,
which is not followed with a parallel development of ideas and values, then the lifestyle created flattens.
Every cultural creation and is doomed to is in decline.
If people are squeezed dry, no development can be achieved and hope for a better life will fade.
Financial Programmes. A decision must always consider the human factor.
This is a protest and a demand for more humanity and more culture.
A system such as the current one, which ignores its position.
And these feelings cannot, in the long run, survive and will lead to a rupture between its people.
The people will become resentful and more crises will be repeated, eventually growing and spreading.
It is absolutely necessary to move with the new era where education and culture will have a central role in politics, society and the economy.
To overthrow the system and to succeed cannot come only from the demands of the trade Union City Guilds.
It must aim at the more general political will for a progressive redistribution of wealth with social justice.
People must be aware of the need for this change.
But to do this, there must be understanding and enlightenment and courage.
To develop, we must adapt ourselves to reality.
To use the means that contemporary conditions offer to us.
And to function in a way that we can convince others in the importance and power of culture for the development of societies,
and to convince them that culture is not an abstract idea that occupies only the intellectuals.
You must appeal to people from all walks of life.
You have to ask the think, the writer,
the artist and all citizens to give answers and the new meaning and purpose to the conditions and demands of our time.
The wealth of Greece is its culture.
In Greece, at every beat you walk, every step you take, wherever you bend and dig.
Culture was about a culture of thousands of years.
A culture that has created.
That has not been surpassed and which continues to create.
You can count on the fingers of one hand the people who still survive and have a memory of more than 5000 years.
The power of agriculture is its duration.
Agriculture is universal. It is anthropocentric because, man, whatever happens, goes ahead.
It is his destiny. Cultural is the reason.
The cultural is at the centre of our social, economic and political life.
You must believe in the productivity of culture. And we invested it.
For example, in September 2011, I spoke in Beijing at a forum with the title Friendship Between Peoples.
I propose that the big firms should be organised for a constructive dialogue between cultures and that this should
be undertaken by Great China with its huge civilisation and by dying in Greece with its corrosive civilisation.
This proposal was accepted by the Chinese and we have commenced to regulate the organising of the forum.
The topics to be discussed. The renowned international personalities to be invited to take part.
I feel sure that this will be a big international political and cultural event.
When the level of culture, education and election life rise, governments and citizens will understand the problems more easily.
They will evaluate the problems better and will face life with greater understanding and
show greater tolerance for the thinking and acting of other people throughout the ages.
Mankind to school system showed progress and renewal in the long history of human civilisation.
There has been a so a whole series of responses.
Each one making its contribution to moral and electoral regeneration and to the betterment of the quality of life.
If a man wants to develop and progress, he must not forget the eternal values that he himself has created.
If he wants to dream and sing again, he must create new ideas and values.
Men is the driving force. And when men exist, knowledge exists.
And where there is knowledge, there is culture.
And as Sophocles said in his many, many wonders, they are.
And yet none is more wonderful than men.
Thank.