Statement | AHEPA Voices Deep Concern about Refugee Crisis in Greece; Will Not Tolerate Isolation of Greece
Supreme President John W. Galanis issued the following statement on
the refugee crisis and its impact upon Greece ahead of two absolutely crucial March meetings, one an EU-Turkey summit and the second between the prime ministers of Greece and Turkey:
“AHEPA is concerned deeply about the inability of the European Union and Turkey to manage the flow of refugees to Europe, specifically to Greece. The American Hellenic community deems it unacceptable and an outrage that Greece is left to carry a large share of the refugee crisis burden based in part on geographic location and its 8,700-mile border – the largest in Europe – amid a crippling economic crisis. Greece is a reliable NATO ally and EU member-nation and finds itself under enormous economic and social pressure…
Supreme President John W. Galanis visited Saint Photios Greek Orthodox National Shrine, St. Augustine, Fla., and presented a donation to the Saint Photios Foundation in early February. “The St. Photios Foundation thanks AHEPA and its district and local chapters for the ongoing support of St. Photios Greek Orthodox National Shrine,” Shrine Director Polexeni Hillier said. Thirty years ago, AHEPA removed a significant financial burden of the Shrine by burning its mortgage.
St. Photios National Shrine is dedicated to the first colony of Greek people who came to America in 1768.
High School Juniors:Join a select group of Greek American students from across the country for AHEPAcademy, from June 26 – July 2, 2016 atGeorge Mason University, outside Washington, DC. AHEPAcademy is a leadership and professional development program that identifies, educates, inspires, mentors, advances, and networks exceptional Greek-American high school students as they progress through their high school, college, graduate and professional careers. AHEPAcademy is looking for exceptional Greek American high school juniors during the 2015-2016 school year with top grades (minimum 3.5/4.0 GPA or equivalent, or Top 10% of Class), who exemplify scholarship, leadership, character, participation in extracurricular activities, community service, and involvement in the Greek American community to apply for selection to this summer’s AHEPAcademy on Campus program.
AHEPA Welcomes Rep. Steve Pearce to the Hellenic Caucus
AHEPA welcomes news that U.S. Rep. Steve Pearce (R-NM) has joined
Rep. Pearce
the Congressional Caucus on Hellenic Issues, announced Supreme President John W. Galanis. Congressman Pearce represents New Mexico’s Second Congressional District, which includes all of southern New Mexico. Membership in the Hellenic Caucus now stands at134.
“We sincerely thank Congressman Pearce for joining the Caucus,” Galanis said. “We look forward to working with him, and his staff, on issues of importance to the American Hellenic community.”
Rep. Pearce, who served as a combat pilot during the Vietnam War, earning the Distinguished Flying Cross, serves on the House Committee on Financial Services and chairs the Congressional Western Caucus.
Hellenic Caucus Membership at 134.Help It Grow.
ACTION ITEM | Help Us Grow the Hellenic Caucus!
Congress has returned to Washington to commence the Second Session of the 114th Congress. AHEPA asks that you help us to grow the Congressional Caucus on Hellenic Issues to newer heights. The Hellenic Caucus has been an active, bipartisan group in Congress since its founding in 1995. It is co-chaired by U.S. Reps. GusBilirakis(R-FL) and CarolynMaloney(D-NY).
Ahepans tour the Saint Nicholas construction site.
AHEPA is determined to meet its Saint Nicholas Capital Campaign fund raising goal. The administrative year is well underway and donations–large and small–are pouring in for AHEPA’s#RebuildStNicholascapital campaign.
NEW!Thank you to Nathan Hale Chapter 58, Hartford, Conn., which donated $1,000 help #RebuildStNicholas last week.
Our#RebuildStNicholascampaignwebpagehas been updated to reflect the many generous donations we received over the summer.
Has your district or chapter organized a fundraiser for the campaign to #RebuildStNicholas? Take action and support AHEPA’s campaign today! Please tweet about your fundraising activity by using #RebuildStNicholas to share your work with the broader community!
The winter issue of The Ahepanis out! Share it with family and friends by forwarding this electronic version.
Read about how AHEPA honored excellence in the Boston community and maintained its commitment to education through its National Educational Foundation. Also, check out the latest on how AHEPA chapters give back to the community.
As Europe bickers, police fire tear gas on migrants storming borderReuters(Feb. 29) Macedonian police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of migrants who stormed the border from Greece on Monday as a deeply divided Europe traded barbs over the biggest humanitarian crisis in decades.As frustrations boiled over at restrictions imposed on people moving through the Balkans, migrants trapped on the Greece-Macedonia border tore down a metal gate in the barbed wire fence.A Reuters witness said Macedonian police fired several rounds of tear gas into the crowd and onto a railway line where other migrants sat refusing to move, demanding to cross into the country…read more
Refugees Try to Breach Greece’s Border With MacedoniaNew York Times(Feb. 29) Riots erupted on the Greek border withMacedoniaon Monday, as angry refugees broke down a razor-wire fence separating the two countries with a battering ram after the Macedonian authorities
sealed the frontier to prevent them from entering. The conflict surged as the Greek government warned that as many as 70,000 people could be trapped in the country within a month, adding to fears that it would be turned into a giant holding center for migrants, and as aid groups cautioned that a humanitarian crisis was growing…read more
Schaeuble Hints Germany May Be Ready to Give Greece Some LeewayBloomberg(Feb. 27) German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble hinted his country is willing to allow Greece some leeway as it struggles with the twin tasks of reforming the economy and caring for an influx of refugees.”The financial situation is difficult,” Schaeuble told reporters at a Group of 20 briefing in Shanghai. “Greece is in the situation that it is receiving a lot of solidarity from Germany but not from all the others.” Tensions over the handling of the region’s refugee crisis escalated on Friday as Greece denied an Austrian request for talks and the European Union’s top immigration official warned the deepening discord risks disaster. The divisions are widening ahead of an extraordinary summit of the EU’s 28 leaders on March 7 called to take stock of efforts to secure the bloc’s external frontiers and mitigate the influx of migrants…read more
Opinion | The Cost of Isolating GreeceThe Wall Street Journal(Mar. 1) Austria and nine Balkan countries met in Vienna last week to consider ways migrants from war-torn Middle Eastern countries could be prevented from traveling north into Europe through Greece. It’s just the latest in a series of unilateral moves across Europe…read more(subscription required)
Thousands stranded as Greece becomes a migrant ‘warehouse’Associated Press(Feb. 27) Greece is fast becoming the “warehouse of human beings” that its government has vowed not to allow. Hastily setup camps for refugees and other migrants are full. Thousands of people wait through the night, shivering in the cold at the Greek-Macedonian border, in the country’s main port of Piraeus, in squares dotted around Athens, or on dozens of buses parked up and down Greece’s main north-south highway.On Thursday, hundreds of frustrated men, women and children abandoned their stranded buses or left refugee camps, setting off on a desperate trek dozens of kilometers (miles) long to reach a border they know is quickly shutting down to them…read more
Akinci says information on Assia remains will be ‘carefully evaluated’ Cyprus Mail(Feb. 28) Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci said on Sunday the information that came to light recently about the possible remains of 100 missing Greek Cypriots allegedly buried in Assia would be carefully evaluated.In a written statement Akinci said: “I have already spoken with the Turkish Cypriot member of the CMP regarding this matter.”He said that as the leader of the Turkish Cypriots, “and as a human being” he was committed to the joint call he and President Nicos Anastasiades made for those with information on the missing persons to come forward…read more
Elias Demetracopoulos, 87, Dies; Journalist Linked Greek Junta to NixonNew York Times(Feb. 26) Elias Demetracopoulos, an enigmatic journalist who fled Greece after a military coup in 1967 and accused the ruling right-wing junta of illegally funneling a half-million dollars intoRichard M. Nixon’s1968 presidential campaign, died on Feb. 16 at a nursing home in Athens. He was 87.The cause was complications of Parkinson’s disease, his American biographer, James H. Barron, said.Mr. Demetracopoulos’s evidence of secret donations provided President Lyndon B. Johnson “with a chance to damage, if not sink, Nixon’s campaign,” Robert Dallek wrote in 1998 in “Flawed Giant: Lyndon Johnson and His Times, 1961-1973.” The evidence may even have been among the documents that burglars were seeking when they broke into the Democratic national headquarters at the Watergate office complex in 1972…read more
This is MY Greece; 92-Year-Old Woman Delivers Sandwiches to Refugees in Central AthensPappas Post(Feb. 28) One of the things I learned from my upbringing was to never question when someone less-fortunate needed help. “Help first, then ask questions,” my dad would tell me when I worked shifts at the Chateau Restaurant and Lounge on Pittsburgh’s North Side as a kid. The restaurant was in a bit of a rough neighborhood and I was always perplexed at my dad’s willingness to offer free food- often to random people or groups. The Pittsburgh Steelers football players always got free lunches at my dad’s place. Their training facility was nearby and they often came for some good old diner food after a tough practice session…read more
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