Thomas Niles, Former U.S. Ambassador to Greece During Imia Crisis, Dies at 85

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Thomas Niles, a vocation diplomat and US Ambassador to Greece from 1993 to 1997, has died astatine the property of 85. His decease from crab was announced Wednesday, April 30, by his brother, John Edward Niles, successful a societal media post.

Niles served successful Athens during a peculiarly volatile play successful the Balkans pursuing the breakup of Yugoslavia and amid escalating tensions betwixt Greece and Turkey.

His tenure included the 1996 Imia crisis, successful which some nations deployed peculiar forces to disputed islets successful the Aegean Sea.

A Greek Navy chopper clang during the standoff killed 3 officers, and a subject escalation was narrowly avoided. The situation was defused done U.S. mediation, peculiarly by Richard Holbrooke and President Bill Clinton‘s administration.

Both sides agreed to retreat forces and instrumentality to the presumption quo ante, though sovereignty was near unresolved.

Thomas Niles reflects connected the Imia crisis

Reflecting connected the situation a twelvemonth aft leaving Athens, Niles criticized the US determination to stay neutral connected the sovereignty dispute.

“We knew by the clip we took this presumption that the Greeks were close connected the sovereignty argument,” helium said.

“When we refused to instrumentality a presumption it sent a awesome backmost to the Turks that we were prepared to countenance oregon not bash thing astir assertive Turkish behaviour toward the Greeks.”

He besides defended then-Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke’s crisp disapproval of the European Union’s inaction during the crisis, calling it “unkind, possibly unnecessary, but existent nonetheless.”

In 2022, helium was asked what helium remembered astir the crisis: “I retrieve being up each nighttime for my engagement successful the situation with the Greek overseas ministry. And we had the President of the United States connected the telephone beauteous overmuch each night,” helium said.

“We feared that the worst lawsuit script would beryllium 1 successful which existent warring would interruption retired betwixt the Greek and Turkish forces, due to the fact that determination were a ample fig of subject forces successful a precise tiny country maneuvering astir successful the dark, airplanes flying over. There were each kinds of things that could spell wrong, but fortunately didn’t,” helium added.

Niles negotiates the US-Greece subject basal agreement

One of the astir important diplomatic achievements during Niles’ tenure was the dialog of the US-Greek subject basal agreement, which allowed US forces to support a beingness astatine respective cardinal locations successful Greece.

There was important absorption successful Greece to the beingness of US subject bases, peculiarly among the left-wing parties and pupil groups. Niles had to navigate these tensions cautiously portion emphasizing the strategical value of US bases successful Greece for some Greek information and broader NATO objectives.

Before his posting successful Greece, Niles served arsenic US Ambassador to Canada (1985–89), Ambassador to the European Union (1989–91), and Assistant Secretary of State for European and Canadian Affairs (1991–93). He was succeeded successful Athens by R. Nicholas Burns.

Born successful Lexington, Kentucky, connected September 22, 1939, Niles studied astatine Harvard and earned a master’s grade from the University of Kentucky.

He served 36 years successful the US Foreign Service, with earlier assignments successful Belgrade, Moscow, and the US Mission to NATO successful Brussels.

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