As the Republic of Cyprus, we fully agree with the Greek Prime Minister's position on a common European air defence, President Nikos Christodoulides said on Saturday, expressing his conviction that "in the coming years there will be developments in this direction." The President was replying to journalists' questions on the sidelines of his visit to Pafos district for the inauguration of various projects. Asked about his position on the Greek and Polish proposal for a European air defence, President Christodoulides replied that "the issue was first discussed when I was in Athens at the New Democracy party conference, where I was invited by the Greek Prime Minister, during lunch with the President of the Commission". "It was an idea of the Greek Prime Minister with which we fully agree, as the Republic of Cyprus we support this position and I am sure that in the coming years we will have developments in this direction," he noted. President Christodoulides added that "the EU, as I have said many times, in o rder to be able to stand at the international level, in order to play the geopolitical role it wants to claim, it must be strategically autonomous and when we say strategically autonomous we are talking primarily about defence, security and energy issues". "So I fully agree with this proposal," he added on the matter. On another question on the issue, the President replied that "as the Republic of Cyprus we are one of those EU member states which support a strategically autonomous EU. Not in words, in deeds". He added that "one of the three main pillars in order to be able to talk about a strategically autonomous EU is the pillar of defence, the security sector and - I said before - the energy sector." Source: Cyprus News Agency
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