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A Greek book entitled "I, the grandson of a Greek: Nicolas Sarkozy's Salonika," about his Greek Jewish roots has been selling well in the country.
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PARIS (AFP-EJP)---French President Nicolas Sarkozy was due to visit Athens Friday as part of his tour of European capitals before France takes over the rotating EU presidency on 1 July, officials said.
He will meet President Karolos Papoulias and Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis and address the Greek parliament during the one-day trip, the first official visit by a French president to the country in 25 years.
Sarkozy, who is stopping off in Athens on his way to Lebanon to meet Saturday with his newly-elected counterpart Michel Sleiman and with French UN peacekeeping troops, will discuss EU affairs with Greek leaders.
He will also discuss his project for a Mediterranean Union to improve trade, transport and energy links between European countries and nations around the Mediterranean rim including Morocco, Syria, Israel and Turkey.
French presidential officials said the plan, which has met with a cool welcome from some of France's EU partners, is backed "unreservedly" by Greece.
The project was due to be unveiled officially by Sarkozy on July 13 at a Paris summit of Mediterranean candidates eligible to join the proposed new bloc.
Officials in Sarkozy's office also noted that Greeks are very aware that the French president has a Greek grandfather who came from the northern town of Salonika.
A Greek book entitled "I, the grandson of a Greek: Nicolas Sarkozy's Salonika," about his Greek Jewish roots has been selling well in the country, they added.
The book recounts how Sarkozy's family on his mother's side, the Mallahs, established themselves in the late 16th century in Salonika as part of a flourishing Sephardic Jewish community that earned the city the title of "Jerusalem of the Balkans," a fact unknown to most Greeks today.
His maternal grandfather, Benedict Mallah, emigrated to Paris in the early 20th century, served in the French army during World War I and later converted to Catholicism.
Sarkozy only learned of his Jewish origins on his grandfather's death in 1972, the book claims. He came to Salonika for the first time in 1973 to receive part of the family inheritance belonging to his mother and aunt.
The French president is scheduled to pays his first state visit to Israel June 22-24 to mark the country’s 60th anniversary.
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