President of the Hellenic Republic Karolos Papoulias visited the installations of the European Nuclear Research Organisation (CERN) in Geneva on May 3. He was given a guided tour of the underground ATLAS research premises and met with the scientists who are members of CERN's Greek Research Group. Following the tour, President Papoulias stated that Greece has been a founding member of CERN since 1954, despite its poor economic means and thanks to its wealth in human capital.

He further emphasised that Europe had proved that it could compete against any scientific power and contribute globally in the scientific domain, underlining the added value of the Greek scientists in that regard.