US President Donald Trump will meet with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis at the White House on 7 January, 2020. A statement announcing the visit on Monday stated that it “will celebrate the strong economic, security, and cultural ties between the United States and Greece, an important North Atlantic Treaty Organization Ally.” The two leaders “will discuss ways to advance the two nations’ longstanding strategic interests in enhancing stability, prosperity and cooperation throughout the Balkans and eastern Mediterranean.”
The President of the Hellenic Republic Prokopis Pavlopoulos presented Models of Excellence awards to Desmos Non-Profit Foundation and Emfasis Foundation which are partner organisations to The Hellenic Initiative Australia. The two organisations were among the eight who were honoured under The Citizen’s Movement for an Open Society at the Old Parliament House in Athens last month.
The awards were presented to Lena Papalexopoulou, the vice-president of Desmos and to Emfasis co-founder Maria Karra.
Greek-born archaeology Professor Alexander Cambitoglou, founder of the Australian Archaeological Institute in Athens (AAIA), passed away last week at the age of 97. Born in Thessaloniki in 1922, the world-renowned classical archaeologist came to Australia in 1961 and became the first person of Greek descent to be named a university professor in Australia in 1963. The professor spent more than five decades tirelessly championing Australian research in Greece and held the position of Curator of the Nicholson Museum until December 2000. He was at the forefront of his field in classical archaeology, with a specialisation in Attic vase painting – in particular red-figure vase painting of Greek colonies of southern Italy. He established the Australian excavations at the Geometric settlement of Zagora, Andros, in 1967 – a collaboration between the Athens Archaeological Society and the University of Sydney.
Arkadian Donation
The eight clubs that are represented by the Arkadia Centre donated $185,000 for medical research to four organisations at the Kolokotroni Club in North Melbourne. The president of the Arkadia Centre, Vasillios (Bill) Chrisant – he is also vice-president of Prasino club – said that the recipients of the Greek clubs’ fundraising efforts are the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre; The Royal Children’s Hospital; The National Heart Foundation of Australia; and Dementia Australia Research Foundation.
Florida development
Greek billionaire developer John Catsimatidis is about to build the tallest condo tower on the west coast of Florida. The Catsimatidis’ Red Apple Group received site plan approval on Wednesday, with the Tampa Bay Times reporting that St Petersburg’s Development Review Commission has approved a $300m mixed-use project that would include a 45-story condo building, 20-storey hotel, and an over 800-space parking garage. Architects for the project are Miami-based Arquitectonica. The development site was bought for $16.5 million two years ago.
Holiday destination
Greece topped the votes as the best beach holiday destination for 2019 in Russia’s National Geographic Traveller magazine and website. The Greek National Tourism Organisation was pleased of the honour and announced that Greece, Turkey, Vietnam, Cuba and Cyprus were all shortlisted among the 24 candidate destinations, but Greece won with 29 per cent of votes. Greece came out as the winner after the participation of 500,000 people between 29 June and 31 October, 2019.