Greece–United Kingdom relations

British-Greek relations are foreign relations between Greece and the United Kingdom. The two countries share membership of the European Union and NATO, but the issue of the Elgin Marbles removed from the Parthenon by the Earl of Elgin in 1806 and still housed in the British Museum has not been resolved.

Historical links

Britain supported Greece in the Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire in the 1820s with the Treaty of Constantinople being ratified at the London Conference of 1832.

In 1850, the British Foreign Secretary Lord Palmerston sent a Royal Navy squadron to Greece over the Pacifico incident.

When the Greek King Otto was deposed in 1862, Queen Victoria's son Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was chosen to succeed him. However the British government would not allow this. The current British monarch Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom's husband Prince Philip is the grandson of Otto's eventual successor George I of Greece.

Great Britain wrested control of the Ionian Islands from Napoleonic France in 1815. As the "United States of the Ionian Islands", they remained under British control, even after Greek Independence (partly because Greece's first, German king caused concern in London). However, in 1864, Britain responded to calls for enosis by trasnsferring the Islands to Greece.

In 2000, Stephen Saunders, the British military attaché in Athens, was murdered by motorcycle gunmen who were members of Revolutionary Organization 17 November. The investigation that followed led to an unprecedented level of co-operation between Greek and UK Police services, who achieved, following a lengthy investigation the arrest of members of N17 who were then brought to trial.

See also

*List of Ambassadors from the United Kingdom to Greece
*Greeks in Great Britain

References

External links

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