Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had a telephone conversation with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the aftermath of the 6.7 magnitude earthquake that hit Samos and Smyrna (Izmir).

The Prime Minister conveyed to the President of Turkey his heartfelt condolences for the loss of life in Turkey and sent a message of unity of the two peoples.

I just called President @RTErdogan to offer my condolences for the tragic loss of life from the earthquake that struck both our countries. Whatever our differences, these are times when our people need to stand together.

— Prime Minister GR (@PrimeministerGR) October 30, 2020

At the time of the phone call, the tragic news had not become known that at the time of the earthquake, a wall that collapsed had crushed two students on the island of Samos.

Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ phone call with Tayyip Erdogan was the first direct communication between the two in ten months. Their previous conversation was in December 2019, on the sidelines of the NATO Summit in London.

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Earlier, the Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias spoke on the phone with his Turkish counterpart, Mevlüt Cavusoglu, shortly after the earthquake and expressed Greece’s readiness to assist in the Search & Rescue operations in Turkey.

Following the strong earthquake, Eleni Sourani, director of the Greek Prime Minister’s diplomatic office, spoke by telephone with Ibrahim Kalin, adviser and spokesman for Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan.

According to the information by protothema.gr, Eleni Sourani and Ibrahim Kalin expressed their sympathy on both sides. The spokesman of Tayyip Erdogan did not express any request to the Greek side for assistance in dealing with the consequences of the earthquake.