Speech by Christine Lagarde, President of the ECB, at the official dinner of the Bank of Greece in Athens, Greece

Athens, 25 October 2023

Before I start, I should mention that – as we are in our so-called “quiet period” – I will not be making any remarks on current or future monetary policy.

I would like to thank the Bank of Greece for hosting our dinner tonight. And thank you for the tremendous effort you have put into organising this external Governing Council meeting at your impressive headquarters here in Athens.

Standing in this hall, I am struck by the overwhelming sense of continuity with the past. So much of what we consider to be European civilisation has emerged from these surroundings.

This is the home of Pericles and the cradle of democracy. It gave us Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and the foundations of our philosophy. The ancient Greeks taught us mathematics via Euclid, science via Archimedes and poetry through Homer.

And this is not to mention the timeless…