then soviet corporation gazprom. to cut a long story short, they convinced me to stay. i went back to oxford and extended my sabbatical leave for a year. lina did not agree at the time. " i'm not going back to greece ", she said, " at least not until you return to oxford for good ". we agreed that this would be the best. deep down, i had always wanted to return to greece. unlike lina. 1 / 8 bis - central bankers'speeches so i returned to athens without her. as a special advisor to the ministry of national economy on sabbatical from the university of oxford. and that was it! i really loved to pair academic work with policymaking. i decided to find a permanent job in greece, something that didn't take long. soon, i joined the university of athens, after a vacancy announcement, at the department of economics. meanwhile, the late dimitris halikias, who at the time was governor of the bank of greece, told me that he would engage me as an advisor to the bank of greece once my contract with the ministry of national economy ended, if i decided to stay in greece and leave oxford for good. i went back to oxford only to resign. lina and i had decided to take risk and quited prominent academic jobs in oxford, london and bristol to return home to greece. the words of my superiors at the university of oxford, the late sir partrick nairne ( provost of st. catherine's college ) and the late robert mabro ( president of the oxford institute for energy studies ), as they were bidding me farewell, are still ringing in my ears : " you must be mad to leave oxford ". they didn't make me change my mind. i left. lina and i did not regret leaving, but we both feel a huge debt to oxford. especially to the true meritocracy of the system. we worked hard, got top - notch doctorate degrees and found top research posts at a very young age. greece has honoured me with very important posts, both in the public and the private sector. i was fortunate and privileged to serve at the economic and financial sectors of my country and to cooperate with the governments of six prime ministers : andreas papandreou, costas simitis, panagiotis pikrammenos, antonis samaras, alexis tsipras and kyriakos mitsotakis.

. with regard to public finances, which is and should remain our number one priority, given the fiscal challenges ahead and the need to maintain our fiscal credibility, i would like to point out that we are still in the early stages of implementation of the new stability and growth pact ( gsp ). the revised fiscal framework imposes control on government net expenditure growth, while also implying that any fiscal space created on the revenue side will be used to reduce public debt. these new conditions are opening up scope for rapprochement and synthesis between political parties towards consensus decisions on how to prioritise public spending and investment and improve their efficiency, combat tax evasion ( with a view to broadening the tax base ) and ensure a fairer distribution of tax burdens. at this point, let me elaborate on the disproportionately heavy burden of defence expenditure borne by greek taxpayers relative to taxpayers in many other euro area countries, which is linked with the protection of european borders and, in particular, greek - turkish relations. the burden of such expenditure, which primarily concerns imported military equipment, falls exclusively on greek taxpayers. what is lacking today is a coherent and effective european security policy in the area of defence ( as also suggested by the draghi report ), aimed at maximising the benefits of defence investment and minimising the disproportionate costs entailed by defence equipment ( e. g. through defence co - production programmes ). at the same time, efforts should continue so as to find points of convergence in greek - turkish relations, given their bearing on greece's economic and social performance, stability and security. a very important fact to note is that the dialogue between greece and turkey which started in 2023 has already delivered significant results with regard to airspace infringement over the aegean sea, managing migration flows and economic cooperation. but above all, it has created an environment of stability and security for citizens : it is no coincidence that, while two years ago greek - turkish relations, together with the rising cost of living, were citizens'primary concern, nowadays, as suggested by opinion polls, citizens are still interested but not worried. this has had a strong positive impact on the stability and outlook of the greek economy. i believe that an agreement 7 / 8 bis - central bankers'speeches on the settlement of our dispute with turkey, on the delimitation of maritime zones, would be more than welcome, unquestionably paving the way for long and sustainable peace as