Olympic Education in ‘2004 and beyond’
An ambitious program of Olympic Education projects that focuses on developing a volunteer spirit among schoolchildren was announced yesterday by Deputy Education Minister Eleni Kourkoula. Over 29 million euros from the Culture Ministry’s Olympic Games General Secretariat are to go toward funding the projects. The Education Ministry has invited schools, municipalities and non-governmental organizations to propose activities promoting culture, sport, the Olympic truce and the abolition of social exclusion. Kourkoula said that schoolchildren had already shown a great interest in the program, whose slogan is «2004 and beyond,» reflecting the ministry’s goal of taking the volunteer spirit beyond the needs of the 2004 Olympic Games. In other words, Papandreou is the «good guy,» dismissing reservations over Ankara’s benign intentions. Cem, however, makes no secret of the fact that he talks with his Greek counterpart as a representative of Turkey’s hardliners, dismissing calls for compromise. Only God knows what Greece can gain from such a rapprochement. Or rather, Allah.
