President of the Republic Karolos Papoulias on Wednesday received a delegation of the Hellenic American Educational and Progressive Association (AHEPA), headed by AHEPA supreme president Nicholas Karacostas.
Papoulias expressed the motherland's pride and gratitude to the "dynamic and very significant" Greeks abroad, who mirror the dynamism of Hellenism in the countries in which they live.
On the economic crisis, Papoulias noted that the grandfathers of today's overseas Greeks had once faced a major crisis, but "they overcame it precisely because they had this dynamism of the Greeks", adjusted, worked hard, created and earned the acknowledgement of the countries in which they lived and worked.
The Hellenes abroad, he continued, "give so much to both their countries".
"As things turned out, you have two homelands. But because Greece is smaller and poorer, I believe that you love it more," Papoulias added.
Karacostas, in turn, pledged that AHEPA will make every possible effort to help Greece and Cyprus, noting that he had given the assurance to prime minister George Papandreou in their meeting earlier in the day.
source: ANA-MPA
