Selection: Michalis Katsigeras

NASSER INTERVIEW IN KATHIMERINI: (From an interview with Eleni Vlachou) Cairo, 3 - “Yesterday evening, following a press conference with foreign journalists, the president of Egypt, Mr Gamal Abdel Nasser, granted me an hourlong interview during which he was kind enough to reply to questions about the conflict over the Suez Canal and Egypt’s general position regarding its current problems. The answers he gave were as follows: ‘As a responsible leader of a nation, I am preparing for the worst and I am not at all concerned as to whether others are or are not determined to do (the worst). The Suez Canal was the last remnant of colonial imperialism in Egypt and it was not possible for us to tolerate it any longer, nor were we about to surrender it for the benefit of collective, international colonialism. We provide every guarantee for the continuation of free shipping through the canal. However the canal is on Egyptian territory and belongs to the Egyptian people. If we need to wage a war to defend it, then we will do so. I am fully prepared to do so.’”