The High Commission of the Republic of Cyprus in London hosted a working meeting of diplomats from Cyprus, Israel and Greece together with representatives from the main diaspora organisations of the Cypriot, Jewish and Greek communities in the United Kingdom to discuss bridge building and practical cooperation.
The meeting, which was chaired by the Cypriot High Commissioner, HE Euripides Evriviades, was addressed by the Cypriot Presidency’s Commissioner for Cypriots in the Diaspora Photis Photiou, Israeli Ambassador HE Mark Regev and Greek Ambassador HE Dimitris Caramitsos-Tziras before Board of Deputies of British Jews President Jonathan Arkush and National Federation of Cypriots in the UK President Christos Karaolis exchanged ideas regarding cooperation.
All present expressed the need to deepen cooperation based on shared values and common challenges both in the East Mediterranean and in the United Kingdom.
The meeting in London follows on from the 2nd Trilateral Summit Declaration signed in Jerusalem in December 2016 between Cyprus, Greece and Israel and the first trilateral meeting on diaspora issues in Jerusalem in March 2017.
Both Christos Karaolis and Jonathan Arkush recalled their respective organisations’ successful collaboration in January 2017 when an event about the Jewish internment camps in Cyprus during the Second World War was attended by more than two hundred people and expressed their desire to deepen this collaboration.
Jonathan Arkush spoke of the great potential that cooperation brings to all three communities, highlighting the sizeable diasporas concentrated in the same regions of North and East London, while Christos Karaolis emphasised the significant strength that he believes could come from cooperating on political engagement, entrepreneurship and interfaith issues.
The representatives from Greek organisations all expressed their desire to collaborate with the Cypriot and Jewish communities in the UK in the fields they represented including business, energy, shipping, science and academia.
Following this meeting in London, the next tripartite meeting at a political level will take place in Thessaloniki, Greece in June. After the conclusion of that meeting, another meeting involving diaspora organisations is planned to take place in London.