Defence Minister Dimitris Avramopoulos, who was the keynote speaker at a high-level conference on the future of the European defence sector organised by the European Commission in Brussels on March 4, stressed the key role played by small and medium-sized enterprises in the effectiveness and competitiveness of the European defence industry. After the completion of the conference, Avramopoulos said that "the role of the small and medium enterprises is a key parameter for the activity as well as the competitiveness of the European defence industry. This is confirmed by our successful moves to save the Hellenic Defence Systems (EAS) and our institutional interventions for the role that we want to be consoldated for small and medium-sized enterprises, mainly in the sub-assembly sector. With the utilisation, as we pointed out, of the potential and know-how of the European Defence Agency."

Avramopoulos also said that "in these crucial historic conjunctures, Greece is exercising and must exercise its stabilising role in the wider region and not only that. Both in the framework of the Greek EU presidency's requirements and on the basis of relations of trust with the countries desiring to join the European Union."