India’s ambassador to Greece met with the management of the Thessaloniki Port Authority before Indian PM Narendra Modi arrived in Greece at the end of August. It is expected that Greek PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis will discuss with Modi in New Delhi in the first half of 2024 about India using Greek ports outside of China-controlled Piraeus.
Following Modi's visit, it was also revealed that Indian billionaire industrialist Gautam Adani is interested in investing in a Greek port, with Volos and Kavala specifically mentioned.
No matter which port is ultimately utilised by India, whether it be Kavala, Volos or Thessaloniki, Greece is becoming India's Gateway to Europe, and both our countries will gain much from this arrangement, not just in the economic sense but in the strategic too.
Greece deepens its importance on the new trade routes emerging from the East, and India gains entry into the Mediterranean for the first time in history. Turkey is again bypassed, thus once again undermining the myth that the East can only reach the West via Turkey.
To further reduce Turkey's importance, the grand project of bypassing the Bosporus to reach the Danube must be pursued. The proposed 650km canal will reach the Danube River in Serbia from Thessaloniki via Skopje and slash shipping time to the Danube by three and a half days.
Completing the canal will not only save shipping companies time and, therefore, consumers money, but it will drive a large amount of maritime traffic away from Turkey and straight into the heart of the Balkans, making the Istanbul Canal an even bigger waste of resources.
This is a project that New Delhi should seriously consider getting involved in, especially since a more undermined Turkey also means a more undermined Pakistan.
At the same time, reconstructing a railway line from Belgrade to Skopje will assist in transforming Serbia into the Balkan’s main transportation and energy hub. The railway connection will also extend to Thessaloniki.
A railway connection between Thessaloniki and the Danube will benefit India as it can access another route to reduce transportation time to European markets by days.
Although Turkey constitutes a major part of China's Belt and Road Initiative’s land route, the eventual construction of a railway link and canal from Thessaloniki will be a major blow to this ambition as Turkey will be completely bypassed.
Turkey will remain a land-based power as it has traditionally and always been, while Greece, which already has the world’s second largest commercial fleet measured in tonnage, will have more Eastern cargo reaching its ports.
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