Prime Minister George Papandreou said on Monday evening that his government aims at changing all that has not changed for many decades, in his opening address at the 13th Symi Symposium titled: "Fast Forward: Progressive ideas for Greece, Europe and the World" on the Saronic island of Poros (July 12-15).

Papandreou also said that Greece, "which has many and important friends who can and want to help it, will be at the focus" of the Poros meeting.

Papandreou identified some of the factors he believes have caused the crisis in Greece and other parts of the world: "the major lack of transparency that existed in the financial system, the lack of democratic checks and balances, the inequality that exists in the world and the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few people."

European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and European Commission Vice-President Catherine Ashton, [PHOTO] who also addressed the symposium's opening event, called for the establishment of a 21st century European diplomatic service, a Union's foreign policy - using only one voice - focusing on its neighbourhood and the better co-operation between the EU and its strategic partners.

Participants at the symposium include French politician Segolène Royal, Lloyd M. Bentsen Jr. Chair in Government/Business Relations and Professor of Government James Galbraith, and Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz.

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