Greek academics honored to receive reply letter from Xi

In the spring of 2020, eight universities at the two ends of the Eurasian region, in Greece and China, launched a common mission to establish the Center of Chinese and Greek Ancient Civilizations.

Last week, the center was officially inaugurated in Athens after three years of efforts, despite the difficulties resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic.

For Stelios Virvidakis, a professor at the University of Athens, it was a particular honor to receive congratulations from President Xi Jinping after he and four other Greek scholars introduced the preparatory work to Xi in a recent letter.

"We know that President Xi must be very busy and we couldn't be sure that he would find the time to send us a reply. It showed that he recognized the importance of the values we wanted to promote," he told China Daily.

In his reply, Xi underlined the importance of deeply understanding the age-old origins and rich content of different civilizations and allowing the essence of all civilizations to benefit the present generation and all mankind.

"We share the (Chinese) president's conviction that the legacy of both civilizations can once more provide spiritual guidance helping us deal with the serious problems humanity is facing," Virvidakis said.

Pantelis Golitsis, an assistant professor at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and one of the authors of the letter to Xi, said he was grateful to the president for his generous support for the scientific activities of the center.

"I completely share his vision about the importance of mutual learning among civilizations, which drives human prosperity and global peace," he said, adding that Greece and China have a lot to learn from each other.

The center was the outcome of the consensus reached by Chinese and Greek leaders during Xi's state visit to the European country in 2019.

After visiting the Acropolis Museum accompanied by then Greek president Prokopis Pavlopoulos, Xi said the tour left him with a beautiful and memorable impression, and deepened his understanding of ancient Greek civilization. He said he felt the impact of history and further realized that China and Greece, as two ancient civilizations, have much in common.

After the visit, the two sides started to build a center dedicated to what the two leaders proposed.