Rama is "crucified" in the Greek media for the joke about Plato and Aristotle, the Prime Minister: It is unbelievable that a humorous sentence is taken out of context

2026-01-16 15:45:53Politikë SHKRUAR NGA REDAKSIA VOX

Rama is "crucified" in the Greek media for the joke about Plato and

Prime Minister Edi Rama has reacted after the article published by the Greek media Protothema, regarding a recent interview of the head of government with Greek journalist John Defterios.

In the Greek media, the jokes exchanged at the conference the day before in Abu Dhabi between Rama and Defterios were treated as irony and insults to Greece. Rama describes the media "Protothema" as a nationalist media that serves "some tired Greek politician" and that there is nothing else in that article except a deformation of the humorous context revealed in that panel.

"I am amazed by the reaction of some media outlets in Athens and some tired Greek politicians, regarding my not at all tendentious, but friendly humorous tones during the conversation with the esteemed journalist John Defterios at the panel organized during the Sustainable Development Summit in Abu Dhabi! It is incredible that a sentence said with humor, can be completely disconnected from the context and turn into a public polemic with nationalist pathos, which unfortunately happens often in media Athens!

But I assure all those who are worried and hurt that I have not the slightest doubt that Plato and Aristotle are Greek philosophers and that Ancient Greece is the cradle of European civilization; that Greek culture deserves only admiration, not only for the philosophers of antiquity but also for the poets, writers, filmmakers and the music it has given to humanity; that Greece is a country for which I have the most positive feelings, that the Greek people are for me an irreplaceable neighbor and an inalienable brother of the Albanian people and that I have special respect for the Prime Minister of Greece!

Did we understand? I hope so.

But let no one among the worried and hurt ask me for my humor, that anyone who writes and speaks Greek with the nationalist pathos of the aforementioned, should seem to me a descendant of Plato and Aristotle!

"That's it," Rama writes.


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