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Meropi Kyriacou Honored as TNH Educator of the Year
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
A cooling down of tensions with Turkey – which had previously repeatedly violated Greek airspace with fighter jets – is now seeing Greece reportedly going to work out a deal to send 32 older F-16s to Ukraine to beat back the ongoing invasion from Russia.
In a report, Al Jazeera correspondent John Psaropoulos said those would be older jets that were going to be decommissioned as Greece is seeking newer versions from the United States and wanting to also acquire American-made F-35s that Turkey also covets.
Greece was among the first countries to send equipment, weapons, and ammunition to Ukraine, which drew the ire of Russia, with whom it had long ties as a fellow Orthodox Country before the invasion tested that.
The report said that Greece is looking to transfer the older F-16s to Ukraine by selling them back to the U.S., which would upgrade them and then send them, no explanation why a circuitous route is being considered.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had said, in deciding to withhold additional help for Ukraine he said Greece would continue to back, that he didn’t want to compromise Greece’s security in case Turkey becomes belligerent again.
The news report, citing a Greek Air Force engineer not named, said even passing on the older F-16s to Ukraine could be problematic. “Because of our neighbors, we are obliged to have very powerful armed forces,” said the source in reference to Turkey.
“The sale of 32 F-16s … would open a big hole in the Air Force,” the source added, with Mitsotakis earlier saying that the European Union should have a bigger role in the conflict besides imposing sanctions on Russia.
Sending the F-16s to Ukraine could also ramp up the tension even more with Russia, with an airstrike near a Mitsotakis’ visit to Ukraine earlier was seen sending him a message to back off helping, which made him more resolute.
LOOK TO THE SKIES
“It was a message to Greece, a message to the Russophilic portion of Greek society,” Konstantinos Filis, a professor of International Relations who directs the Institute of Global Affairs at the American College of Greece told the news site.
Greeks had rallied around Russia – not Ukraine – when the invasion began, but support of 70 percent at the time has fallen to just 30 percent now, said the Athens-based think tank Dianeosis about the attitude of Greeks changing.
“The Russians are very annoyed with the Greeks,” Filis told Al Jazeera. “Greece has supported Ukraine very clearly from the beginning.” That included sending Ukraine some 20,000 155mm artillery shells, Stinger missiles, and 40 Soviet-era BMP-1 armored personnel carriers.
When the invasion began, Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Maria Zacharova called Greece’s decision to send weapons to Ukraine “deeply mistaken” and “criminal,” but relations have worsened since then.
Unofficially, Greece has sent Ukraine even more direct military assistance, including self-propelled guns, with some officials putting the aid’s total value in the range of $300 million over two years, the report said, adding that more could be coming.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has encouraged more military transfers, offering Greece $200 million in foreign military financing in a letter to Mitsotakis in January. “The government is trying to offer things that can be replaced,” a diplomatic source told Al Jazeera. “In theory, we could offer antiaircraft guns and S-300 air defense systems.”
But the S-300s were acquired from Russia and sending them to Ukraine to be used against Russia would require Russia’s approval, making it apparently nonsensical, Greece reportedly looking at sending one battery based on the island of Crete.
