08 DECEMBER 2018 / Freie Universität Berlin’s Center for Modern Greece hosts Ambassador Jens Plötner

On Friday, December 7th, the Center for Modern Greece (CeMoG) at the Freie Universität Berlin hosted the fifth installment of the CeMoG Lecture. Jens Plötner, German Ambassador to Greece, discussed how Greek-German relations have developed over time.

The Center for Modern Greece, which opened in 2014, was created through a grant from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF), building on the University’s already established Chair of Modern Greek Studies. SNF Group Chief Financial Officer Christina Lambropoulou, who gave remarks at the inauguration of the Center, also said a few words at the lecture.

“While in other contexts, freedom indicates independence and an ability to act without being tied down,” she said, “in the case of free knowledge exchange, interdependence and extensive ties are its essential element. And those ties are not a feature of an institution’s resting state; they are formed and strengthened through intentional, focused effort, such as that we see enacted here at the Center for Modern Greece.”
(Read the full speech)

Promoting Hellenism around the world is a key component of SNF’s mission, and forming enduring collaborations around the subject with academic institutions has been a core focus of this effort. Other partners in similar initiatives include Yale University, Simon Fraser University, University of Oxford, Koç University in Istanbul, King’s College London, and the Center of Byzantine, Modern Greek and Cypriot Studies in Granada, among others.

Ambassador Plötner also joined SNF’s October DIALOGUES event in Athens, a “Greek Oktoberfest,” speaking there on a similar theme of Greek-German relations.