The Minister of Foreign Affairs Nikos Dendias, attending today the Council of Foreign Ministers of the EU in Luxembourg, thanked the “enormous efforts” made by the High Representative of the EU and the Foreign Ministers of France, Germany and Italy for the evacuation of Greek citizens from Khartoum, noting however, that Europe in the crisis in Sudan “has not received a very good grade”.

The entire statement of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Nikos Dendias, is as follows:

“At today’s Council of Foreign Ministers I will request a detailed discussion on the issues of evacuating European citizens from Khartoun, from Sudan. I already had a related discussion yesterday with Josep Borel and he accepted my request.

From there, I want to thank Joseph Borel for the enormous efforts he is making, as well as to thank the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, Catherine Colonnathe foreign minister of Germany, Analena Burbok and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Italy, Antonio Tajani for the help they gave for the evacuation of Greek citizens from Khartoum.

But I would like to say something else. It is at least contradictory to vote for texts such as the military compass and indeed with triumphant tones and then not be able at the European level, despite the efforts of the High Representative, to be able to organize a pan-European evacuation operation.

Europe is judged by its ability to react to crises and as Europe – I want to say – we have not received a very good grade in the crisis in Sudan”.