President Papoulias was given a guided tour of the underground ATLAS research premises and met with the Greek scientists comprising CERN’s Greek Research Group.

President Papoulias said “as you know, Greece is a founder member of CERN since 1954 with the poor economic means that it has, but with the rich human potential. This moved me being a Greek, to be seeing the potential that my country has. And I think that at some moment we shall be bringing this potential within the walls as well”.

He added that “People say that an important scientific potential leaves Greece due to the crisis. It might be true. But they come back again. And those who leave our country, our own scientists, they shine in whatever they do”.

Mr Papoulias continued by saying “our scientists are equal to all our foreign scientists friends. I realized this here today. I am glad as the President of the Greek Republic, I feel that Greece does offer. It offers a lot of things in the science world”.

He also stressed that “We Greeks carry a specific gene, an historic gene. Here I felt that Greek scientists carry the gene of Democritus”.

He further mentioned that “Europe is showing its potential, its scientific potential. It can compete with whatever great power, it is a great power and it must contribute to global developments and in the scientific sector in particular, where it has great potential”.