Sudanese Greeks

The main hall of the Hellenic Community in Khartoum (2015)

The Greek diaspora in Sudan is small in the number of its members (estimated at around 150 in 2015), but still a very prominent community in the country. Historically, the diverse group has played a significant role in the political, economic, cultural, and sporting life of Sudan as the only European settler community of considerable size and economic power.

The Greek anthropologist Gerasimos Makras, who is related to the Greeks of Sudan through marriage, stresses that “neutrality and a 'clean hands' ideology has always been central to the Greek settlers' self-image, though it is difficult to be reconciled with political developments.” While “Greeks in Sudan have been proud for being themselves Greeks ‘more than the Greeks of Greece’ “, he concedes at the same time that they, “in the long run, have proved to be culturally and sentimentally surprisingly close to the Sudanese.”

History

Ancient Times

Inter-human and cultural exchange between the Hellenic and Nubian civilisations started at least two and a half millennia ago. The Greek presence in the Nile Valley and its considerable impact on ancient Nubia has long been recognised by scholars. The first recorded contact took place in 593 BC: graffiti at Abu Simbel reveal that large numbers of Greek mercenaries served under Psamtik II in his invasion of the Sudan.

Vice versa, ancient Nubia also had an influence on Greek culture from those early times onwards, as it was well known by scholars throughout the Greek world, where several of the classical writers mentioned it. It evidently inspired curiosity about the exotic lands South of Egypt and particularly about the sources of the River Nile. Hence, the pioneering historian Herodotus (c. 484-c. 425 BCE) made bizarre references to Nubia as a savage land of the “burnt faces” (Aithiopia) and the source of the Nile. Though he is assumed to have been personally familiar with the river only as far as Aswan, he did identify a "City of Ethiopians" at Meroë, apparently from reports by Psamtik II and Cambyses II.

A new era of Greek-Nubian relations began in 332 BCE, when Alexander the Great conquered Egypt and soon dispatched reconnaissance expeditions into Nubia, possibly to find the sources of the Nile. Scholars assume that the potential Ptolemaic Greek threat contributed to the decision by the Kushitic pharaoh Nastasen to move the capital from Napata to Meroë. Greek language and culture were introduced to the Kushitic ruling classes, which may have triggered the creation of an alphabetic Meroitic writing. Hellenic influences are also evident from changes in art styles.

Reconstruction of Strabo's world map

Kushite contact with the Greek world remained sporadic until the invasion of Ptolemy II in the 270s BCE. His interest in Kush - apart from raiding slaves, gold and livestock - was to find a secure source of war elephants. At the same time, the Kushite king Ergamenes (Arkamani II) reportedly studied Greek language, while Greek descriptions of "Ethiopia" increased. Eratosthenes (c. 276 BC-194 BCE), the Greek geographer and librarian at Alexandria, sketched “with fair accuracy” the course of the Nile as far south as what is now Khartoum, based on the accounts of various travellers. Pliny listed a number of Greeks who had travelled to Meroë and sometimes beyond: Dalion, Aristocreon, Bion, Basilis, and Simonides the Younger, who apparently lived at Meroe for five years.

Relations between Kush and Ptolemaic Egypt thereafter remained tense but stable. By the time of Ptolemy VIII (170-163 BCE) Greek ships regularly sailed on the Red Sea and to Meroitic ports. The Nubian upper class traded with Greek merchants and adopted certain Hellenic styles of life. However, following the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BCE and an unsuccessful attempt by the Romans to conquer the kingdom Greek influences withered in Nubia. The account of Strabo, the geographer and historian of Greek descent, in his Geographia is one of the last references to Nubia from that time.

Medieval Times

Copy of a Greek graffito from Musawwarat as-Sufra reading "The swamps of Jesus".

Inscription of a christian prayer at the museum in Merowe

Half a millennium later, Hellenic influence became all the stronger, when Nubia was evangelised from Byzantium: Around 540 CE, the Empress Theodora sent Greek-speaking missionaries to the lands South of Egypt to convert the people there to the Christian belief. They succeeded and soon afterwards three kingdoms emerged with Christianity as their official religion: Nobatia, Makurrah and Alwah. The former two Northern ones, which later merged as Nobatia at Old Dongola, showed especially strong elements of Byzantine Greek influence. The Greek alphabet was adopted from neighbouring Coptic Egypt and the Old Nubian language was rendered into Greek letters. By 700 CE, a combination of Greek, Arabic, and Coptic prevailed over the Meroitic language and writing.

Thus, Greek became in Christian Nubia at least for the first five centuries the main language of the Church and generally of expressing both official and private piety. Greek texts have been mostly found in epitaphs and liturgical manuscripts, as well as in paintings of Nubian churches and other places of religious importance. The language was apparently widely used in those contexts until the fifteenth century, but it is assumed that around the 10^th / 11th century it was increasingly replaced by Nubian. Analysis of Greek inscriptions on terracotta and stone shows regional differences though: in the kingdom of Makuria the Greek language was the main linguistic vehicle for the “Byzantine-like royal court at Old Dongola”, whereas in the Kingdom of Nobatia the Coptic language played a similarly important role. Hence, for example, the foundation stela of the Faras Cathedral was carved in both languages.

There is also evidence of inter-action during the times of the Mameluk rule over Egypt: a Greek Eunuch from their court was exiled to Suakin at the Red Sea in the late 15th century. The end of Christianity in Nubia around that time did not necessarily mean, however, the end of contacts with Greeks in the lands that are now Sudan, since at least in the late 17th century some Greek merchants settled in the Funj Sultanate of Sennar.

Modern Times

Turkiya (1821-1885)

When the Turkish-Egyptian forces of the Ottoman Khedive Mohamed Ali conquered the Funj kingdom in 1821, the invading army reportedly included Greek mercenaries. More Greeks followed in subsequent years from Egypt, not only as military officers and soldiers, but also as interpreters, some of whom guided expeditions further southward, as well as medical doctors and pharmacists, who opened several drug stores. However, it was especially Greek merchants who came through Egypt with its established Greek trading-houses to trade in ivory, leather, ostrich feathers, and Gum Arabic.

Their commercial activity and the number of merchants greatly increased after the monopoly of trade was abolished in 1849 and the White Nile was opened for navigation. Some also became involved in the trade of slaves from what became Southern Sudan. The Greek historian Antonios Chaldeos, who has written his PhD thesis about the history of the Greek communities in Sudan, established from the local histories of Omdurman residents that one of those slave-traders was George Averoff, after whom the Omdurman quarter of Aburoof is still named. Moreover, Greek entrepreneurs in Kassala and Gedaref used slaves on their cotton plantations in the 1870s.

While for the first five decades of the Turkiya most of the Greeks settled in Omdurman, the port town of Suakin became another favourite destination after the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. El-Obeid and Bara in Kordofan also had large and stable Greek communities. In 1871, the Kingdom of Greece established a vice-consulate in Khartoum, mainly to cater to the needs of Greek merchants. It was one of the first diplomatic representations in Sudan. According to the written account by one of the Greek settlers, there were 193 Greeks in Sudan in 1881, of whom 132 were based in Khartoum.

Other Greeks did not come to Sudan for commercial reasons though. For instance, Giuseppina Tabran, a Roman Catholic missionary sister from a Greek Catholic family in Tiberias, accompanied Bishop Daniele Comboni in 1871 and was the first mother superior of the mission to Central Africa. And Panayotis Potagos, a Greek traveller and physician, explored southern Darfur and Bahr El Ghazal in 1876-77.

When the indigenous Mahdist insurrection against the colonial ruler of the Turkiya started in 1881, the Greeks were soon affected by the uprising as well. After the fall of El Obeid in January 1883, ten Greeks were taken captives by the insurgents. At least five Greeks, who fought on the side of the Ottoman forces, were killed in various battles against the Mahdists. One of them was the Ottoman surgeon-general of Sudan Gheorghios Douloghlu, a Greek born in Egypt. He died when a Turco-Egyptian force was annihilated by the rebels in November 1883. A Greek trader reportedly played a key-role in this crucial event as a guide of this ill-fated expedition led by William Hicks Pasha and was later suspected of misleading it on purpose. Allegedly, some Greek merchants also joined the camp of the Mahdi deliberately as renegades and served in important positions of his army.

More Greeks were taken captives in the course of the rebellion, for instance a grocer at El Fasher after the capitulation of Darfur at the end of 1883. During the siege of Khartoum, which started in March 1884, the Mahdi reportedly sent a Greek merchant, who had converted to Islam after his capture, to negotiate with Governor-General Charles Gordon, who refused. Numerous Greeks endured the siege with the British Pasha.

Mahdiya (1885-1898)

When the Mahdists finally conquered Khartoum in January 1885, several Greeks were amongst those killed by the victorious Dervishes. The Greek consul Nicola Leontides was brutally executed. Eight months later, shortly after the death of the Mahdi, Mahdist commander Osman Digna had two Greeks executed in Kassala.

Those Greeks, who had been captured and kept alive by the Mahdi, were forced by his successor, the Khalifa, to convert to Islam. Some of them agreed to marry Catholic nuns pro forma in order to protect them. Altogether though, it seems that the Khalifa had them treated relatively mildly. By the account of the Austrian missionary Josef Ohrwalder, who managed to escape after ten years, many Greeks continued to do “fairly well in business” and were even allowed to travel, but were restricted to Omdurman after a number of Europeans escaped.

One of the Greek captives, Nicolas Papadam, wrote down his memoir after the end of the Mahdist rule, painting an extraordinarily humanising portrait of the Mahdi, the Khalifa and the Mahdist movement, especially in contrast to “the arrogant, tyrannical and hated Turkish rule.” Makras concludes:

“The Mahdi's label of the Greeks as 'men of trade' with no responsibility for political and social developments summarises the way the Sudanese have always seen the Greek settlers. Naturally, this conception has been warmly embraced by the Greeks themselves although, strictly speaking, it has never corresponded to reality.”

Thus, the Greek captives held out in Omdurman for more than 13 years, though it may be argued that some of them may have had no particular desire to leave, especially those who had been born and brought up in the Sudan.

Meanwhile, more Greek merchants moved to Suakin, which stayed under Egyptian and, respectively, British control. Its harbour became a strategic hub for plans to re-take the Sudan. They mainly engaged in catering to the needs of the military. There were fourteen canteens run by Greeks like Angelo Capato, who went on to become one of the most eminent businessmen in Sudan. He also started the first ice factory and was contracted to supply meat to the troops.

Likewise, when an Anglo-Egyptian army under Herbert Kitchener's command began moving up the Nile in 1896 to defeat the Mahdists, Greek traders followed the expedition to provide those forces with supplies, especially food and drinking water for the workers involved in the construction of the railway network, thus literally paving the way for the British-led re-conquest. Amongst them were Capato and Nicola Loiso, who became another famous business tycoon in Sudan. According to the Sudanese historian Hassan Dafalla, “there was a saying, during those imperialistic days, that whenever a British officer was sent for military conquest, a Greek grocer always accompanied him with his whisky ration.”

Anglo-Egyptian Condominium (1899-1955)

When Kitchener’s forces defeated the Mahdist army in 1898, they counted a community of 87 Greeks in Omdurman, including non-Greek family members. Many of them, like their dean Dimitri Kokorembas and the later chronicler Nicolas Papadam, chose to remain in the British-dominated Anglo-Egyptian Sudan.

This nucleus of the Greek community was immediately enlarged by interpreters and merchants who entered the Sudan with the invading army, either from the Red Sea or along the Nile. The latter specialised as contractors in supplying logistics to the military and the newly established government. Some Greeks also officially served in the Anglo-Egyptian administration, including in the Railway and Steamers Department, as clerical and technical staff. Altogether, the association between the colonial regime and the traders essentially defined the Greek presence in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan.

From the point of view of the British-dominated government the Greeks, whether individually or as a group, were the ideal expatriates as they were completely innocent of political ambitions. Makras concludes: “Capato - and probably many other Greeks - saw themselves as stalwarts of the 'colonial' order.” He has also found that “Greeks from Sudan remembered and emphasized the good relations they had with the Sudanese because, unlike the British, they were not “colonialists”, but rather people of a humble background. This, however, did not prevent them from having racist attitudes towards non-Greek Sudanese, or even people of mixed origin, similar to those other Europeans had.” However, he also concedes “a healthy scepticism towards the British, the French and the other 'Big Powers' and their political schemes”.

While the Sudanese middle classes struggled to recover from the crushing defeat of 1898, the Greek traders had the market for themselves for a period of two decades or more. Already during the first months, Greek speculators purchased land “for trifling sums" in the Khartoum area, so that “much of the most valuable land in the new city passed thus at once into the hands of a few wealthy capitalists". The same happened in the fertile Gezira until the introduction of regulation in 1905. One of those who acquired large estates was Capato. This buying spree, until it was curbed by the government, led to a substantial increase in prices, which in turn induced many urban residents to sell their land.

Gordon Memorial College under construction in 1901

However, not all of the Greeks who came to Sudan were stereotypically only merchants and shopkeepers, but there were many other professions as well, including scientists, teachers, physicians, pharmacists, and engineers. During the 1900s and 1910s many Greeks, particularly from the island of Karpathos, came to work as builders, carpenters, masons, and other craftsmen. Greek contractors and subcontractors constructed governmental buildings in Khartoum – including the preservation of the Governor General's Palace - and Port Sudan, and churches (amongst them the Anglican cathedral in Khartoum). Moreover they were involved in setting up irrigation canals for cotton plantations and in the expansion of the railway network. Some of them worked even in remote places like Darfur. Most prominently, Dimitrios Fabricius, a Greek architect of German ancestry, designed prominent buildings like the Gordon Memorial College in Khartoum.

It is still possible to identify a broad pattern of Greek immigration into Sudan that applies also to the Greek diaspora in other parts of Africa: as soon as a Greek, like Capato, had established his business, he would bring in younger compatriots from Greece or Egypt, preferably from his family network. The newly arrived would often work as employees for the first years and then open their own businesses. In this way it came about that many of the Greeks in Sudan at the beginning of the 20^th century originated from the islands of Karpathos (see above), Lesbos, Cephalonia, and Cyprus.

The Greek Orthodox Church in Khartoum (2015)

Thus the number of Greeks grew rapidly: in 1902, there were already about 150 in the Khartoum area. In the same year the “Hellenic Community” of the capital was officially established. Amongst its founding fathers were businessmen like Capato, John Cutsurides, and Panayotis Trampas, who had survived the Mahdyia as a captive and was honoured by the Austrian emperor Franz Josef for protecting Catholic nuns. The Greek community school of Khartoum was established in 1906 with 30 students. Their number doubled within the first decade. Also in 1906, the Hellenic Community of Port Sudan was founded. These societies not only undertook educational functions, but also religious ones as well as offering assistance to their poorer members.

Memorial at the compound of the Hellenic Community in Khartoum for volunteers killed in the 1912 & 1913 Balkan Wars.

Already in 1901 the Condominium government had given a free grant of land in Khartoum to the Greek Orthodox community to build a church. Its foundation stone was laid in 1903 but construction got only completed in 1908. The consecration took place in 1910, but only two decades later did the Greek Orthodox synod of bishops elect a Metropolitan of Nubia, who remained based in Cairo.

At the beginning of World War I in 1914, there were over 800 Greeks in Sudan, by far the largest foreign community. About 500 of them were members in the Greek Rifle Club, which was viewed by the administration as potentially "a very valuable supplementary European force". Some Greeks in Sudan were famous hunters and Capato, for instance, specialised in fitting out big-game hunting parties. In fact, an unknown number of Greek volunteers from Sudan had been fighting during the Balkan wars of 1912 and 1913 against the Ottoman Empire.

After the forced displacement of the Greeks from Asia Minor and the 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey, many of the Greek newcomers to Sudan originated from Constantinople and Smyrna, escaping from abject poverty. By 1929 – in which year Greek businessmen built the first commercial cinema in Khartoum - the number of Greeks in Khartoum had risen to 1,455. The total number in all of Sudan at that time was at around 4,000 – up from about 2,500 in 1920. The Greek school in Khartoum had 170 students in 1925 and 270 in 1936.

Church inside (2015)

During the 1930s, a multitude of private cotton growing irrigation schemes in the agricultural areas of the Gezira and Gedaref were owned by Greeks. The Hellenic Community of Wad Medani in the Gezira had already been established in 1919. From 1933 to 1937, many Greek masons and craftsmen worked in the construction of the Jebel Aulia Dam irrigation scheme, which became the largest dam in the world at the time.

Beyond the places, where Greeks had already settled before the Mahdiya, the newcomers also gradually moved to the most remote corners of the country, like En Nahud in Western Kordofan and Talodi in the Nuba Mountains. Business tycoon Capato soon expanded his business into Kordofan for gum Arabic and Southern Sudan for ivory, before going bankrupt after a series of misfortunes in 1912. Some Greek traders moved on to settle in the Belgian Congo, French Central Africa and other African lands.

Kosti in 1936

In Southern Sudan the colonial government preferred giving licences to Greek merchants, who would go to remote places like Jonglei, rather than to Northern Sudanese "Jellaba" traders. Juba, now the national capital of South Sudan, is said to have been established in 1922 by Greek traders. Another center was Wau, where already in 1910 fifteen Greek merchants were based and reportedly made large profits. The Comboni missionary priest Stefano Santandrea, who served in Wau from 1928 to 1948, stressed though that "their competition prevented their [Northern] rivals from exploiting the natives." The Wau-based Hellenic Community of Bahr El Ghazal was founded in 1939.

From "Le Mondain Egyptien"

One major Sudanese city is still named after a Greek trader, over a century after he settled there: Kosti. Konstantinos “Kostas” Mourikis set up a store on the White Nile, where pilgrims from West Africa to Mecca and Southern trade routes crossed, soon after he had arrived in Sudan in 1899 along with his brother. With regard to the socio-economic composition of the Greeks in Sudan, Makras concludes:

“A small number of Greek merchants climbed up the social ladder and became founders of a 'high class' who held decisive influence over a 'middle class' or what could perhaps more aptly be called the 'salariat'. [..] With the exception of Gerasimos Contomichalos, all members of the Greek 'high class' were well-off merchants and shopkeepers, but no more than that. [..] Always mindful of developments in the political arena, Contomichalos cultivated his relations with the Government and the Palace, while at the same time supporting community leaders with nationalist aspirations. Like Capato, he served as president of the Greek community for long periods of time, but had much more impact than the former - founding churches, schools and other community buildings and offering large sums of money to assist in the establishment of smaller communities in the provinces.”

Elevator sign in the Greek-owned Slavos Building in Gamhouria Street, downtown Khartoum (2015)

Contomichalos, who was a nephew of Capato and reportedly even wielded influence on politics in Athens, developed “particularly close” ties with Abd-al-Raḥman Al Mahdi, a son of the Mahdi and one of the pro-independence nationalist leaders. He thus followed a strategy that other Greeks also pursued in order to arrange themselves with the local elites: already in 1912, two Greek merchants had founded one of the first newspapers in Sudan, the Sudan Herald and its Arabic supplement Raid Al Sudan (the "Sudan Leader"). Though it was under strong government influence and considered by the Sudanese foreign, it still served for a few years as an early forum for Sudanese views.

A photo from 1947 on the walls of the Hellenic Community centre in Khartoum (2015)

By the beginning of World War II, the number of Greeks in Sudan had risen around 4,500. In 1941, the Sudan Defence Force, which was fighting against Fascist-Italian forces in the East and supporting the Allies in North Africa, was opened to Greeks as to other expatriates.

Five years after the end of WWII, the number of Greeks in Sudan had grown to over 5,000. Khartoum East by that time had become known as "Little Greece" with Greek “medical clinics, clubs, retail shops, groceries, bakeries, bars, schools, and churches”. Reportedly, even street signs bore Greek letters in addition to Arabic and Latin ones. The residential area was, in fact, divided into an upper and middle class.

This class-system was also characteristic for the two Greek clubs in the capital: the Grand Club was reserved for the wealthy merchants, whereas the Apollo Club was frequented by the “salariad”. The divide remained in place until the 1970s. Moreover, the Greek community was divided like Greece : between anti-communists and communists. Remarkably, some Greek industrialists supported the Communist Party of Sudan.

Sudan Independence (since 1956)

The entrance of the Contomichalos School in Khartoum (2015)

When Sudan obtained sovereignty from the Anglo-Egyptian Condominium on 1^st January 1956, the Greek settlers in the country were issued Sudanese nationality certificates and generally continued to thrive in the first few years of independence. According to Chaldeos, the Greek community reached its greatest number in 1957 at around 6,000. Makras puts the estimate at 7,000 in the 1950s and the highest level at the Greek School in Khartoum at 611 students in 1966. Chaldeos' figures show that the number of Greeks in Sudan diminished by 1965 to 4,000.

One reason for this exodus was apparently the escalation of the Anyanya-rebellion in Southern Sudan and the brutal counter-insurgency of successive governments in Khartoum. After an Anyanya assault on Wau in early 1964, the military dictatorship of Ibrahim Abboud reportedly “announced that foreign traders would only be allowed to reside in provincial or district capitals in the South, where they could be kept under surveillance, and not in villages. This restriction was aimed at Syrian and Greek traders, who were suspected of helping the rebels.”

Shortly afterwards, four Greek merchants were taken to court for charges of having collected donations for the insurgents, but got acquitted. At the end of 1964 two Greek traders in Bahr Al-Ghazal and Equatoria respectively were arrested on charges of acting as a link between rebels and the outside world. In fact, an internal Anyanya paper claimed that "Greek merchants of Tembura helped by providing supplies” to a rebel camp in the Central African Republic.

When Southern and Northern Sudanese clashed in the streets of Khartoum on the "Black Sunday" of 6 December 1964, one Greek was amongst those who got killed by the mob, though it is unclear under what circumstances. Two grandsons of Dimitri Yaloris, a Greek formerly based in Gogrial, and his Dinka wife, were killed in Bahr El Ghazal after being accused of supporting the Anyanya rebels. It is not clear in which year of the 1960s they died.

Moreover, the Greeks of Southern Sudan, many of whom had married locals, came under pressure from both warring sides: while the accusations from Khartoum continued, Southern opposition forces accused Greek monopolists of keeping the prices of animals “as low as possible to their own advantage" for export to the Middle East. Thus, the Greek community in the South further diminished, after its numbers had already decreased before 1956.

The big exodus of the Greeks from Northern Sudan started in 1969 after the May Revolution of a military regime under Gaafar Nimeiry, which in its early phase pursued a policy of nationalisation. Big companies like Contomichalos and Tsakirolglou were hard hit and most of the disowned entrepreneurs emigrated, many of them to Apartheid South Africa. By 1970, the number of Greeks had come down to around 2,000 and to about 1,800 in 1980. The culture of Greek newspapers, which had been published in Sudan since 1911, ceased to exist. However, some Greek industrialists, who had supported the Communist Party, were allowed to keep their factories.

Another hard hit for the Greek community was the introduction of the draconic “September Laws” under the label of Sharia by Nimeiry in 1983, who had all alcoholic beverages in Khartoum dumped into the Blue Nile. Until this prohibition, the trade in such goods as well as ownership of nightclubs and bars had traditionally been dominated by Greek merchants. Most prominently, the John G. Cutsuridis company was the exclusive distributor of Camel beer produced by the Blue Nile Brewery.

In the same year, one of the most popular Greeks of Sudan passed away in Khartoum: Katarina Kakou who was born in Suakin in 1893. Chaldeos writes: “Although she was poor she was giving help to anyone needed. Lots of people living in the neighborhood visited her in order to take a free meal. Katerina used to be a reference point for the entire region, till her death in 1983.” Respect for her was such that a road near the International Airport of Khartoum was named after her: Katarina Street – one of only two roads named after Greeks. The other one is Contomichalos Street in downtown Khartoum.

The Acropole Hotel in 2015

Since then, the Acropole Hotel in Khartoum has all the more become one of the most prominent places of Greek presence in Sudan. It was founded in 1952 by Panagiotis and Flora Pagoulatos from Cephalonia, who had left war-torn Greece in 1944 and arrived the following year via Egypt. The Washington Post writes: "During the day, he was employed by the British government. After hours, he worked as a private accountant, soon amassing enough capital to open a night club just opposite the governor's palace". When the governor had it closed because of the noise, the couple took over a liquor dealership, opened a wine store, a confectionery shop, and then the Acropole, which soon expanded. The three sons took over the hotel, when Panagiotis passed away: “With their mother’s guidance and their hard work, they managed to turn the hotel into an actual treasure of the city’s cultural and touristic life.”

The residence of the Bishop

Following the devastating 1984/85 famines in Darfur and Ethiopia, the Acropole became the base for many international non-governmental organisations, since it was the only hotel with reliable telephone, telex and fax lines. A framed letter from the Band Aid founder Bob Geldof on the wall of the hotel office gives evidence of his appreciation for the support by the Pagoulatos family and their staff.

On 15 May 1988, the Acropole was shocked by tragedy, when a terrorist commando of the Abu Nidal group bombed the restaurant, killing a British couple with their two children, another Briton, and two Sudanese workers, leaving many injured behind. Yet, the Pagoulatos brothers managed to restore the hotel in a building just opposite the ruins of the old one. It has remained since then one of the most popular places for Western visitors, particularly journalists, archaeologists, and NGO workers.

By the end of the 1980s, the number of Greeks in Sudan had shrunk to less than 1,000. Following the 1989 coup d'état of Islamist forces under Hassan Al Turabi and due to the long-term crisis of the economy, the number dropped to around 500 in 1992 and about 300 in 1996. Most of them emigrated to Greece, after having obtained Greek nationality.

The Greek Community school in 2015 before its closure.

In July 2000, the Greek community suffered another tragedy, when the Greek Orthodox bishop of Khartoum, Titos Karatzalis, was murdered at his residence. Four Sudanese-Greek men were reportedly arrested on murder charges, but one year later acquitted.

With the economic boom of Sudan after the beginning of the oil production and particularly after the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), some Sudan-born Greeks returned to the country for employment and business activities. While this trend reversed again after the 2011 secession of South Sudan and the subsequent plunge of the Sudanese economy, Greece's financial crisis did continue to motivate some to return and/or stay. And new membership of the Greek community has come from an increase in inter-marriage: whereas reportedly up to 90% of Greeks in then Southern Sudan married locals, such relationships used to be rare in what was then Northern Sudan. In the new millenium, however, many such family bonds have grown, especially between Sudanese Copts who went to study in Greece and returned with Greek spouses.Thus, the number of Greeks in Sudan stabilised by 2015 at around 150 - the same level of the Hellenic Community at its foundation in 1902.

Reince Priebus (right) next to Archbishop Demetrios of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America at the 2016 Republican National Convention

Ironically, the enforcement by the Greek-named European Union of draconic austerity measures in Greece led at the same time to the closure of the Greek School in Khartoum by August 2015. Its premises were taken over by the Confluence International School. Only one month later, the embassy of the Hellenic Republic was closed - almost one and a half centuries after it was founded. Greece's new diplomatic representative as Honorary Consul became Gerasimos "Mike" Pagoulatos, with the Honorary Consulate based at the Acropole Hotel.

With the election of Donald Trump as US-President in November 2016 and the naming of Reince Priebus as his first Chief of Staff, the Greeks of Sudan briefly hit international news as well: Priebus' mother Dimitra - née Pitsiladis - was born in Sudan. She met his father, who is of German-English descent, in Khartoum when he served in the US Army on a mission in Ethiopia. When Trump issued an unconstitutional "travel ban" just one week after his inauguration in January 2017, global press outlets accused Priebus of hypcocrisy, since his own mother's country of birth was included in the list.

Greek presence and inspiration is still visible in other Sudanese places, apart from the Acropole, Aburoof, Contomichalos and Katarina Streets, the Hellenic compound in Khartoum, and Kosti. Two of them are restaurants close to the Acropole: Greek Pitta, run by a Greek couple, and Papa Costa restaurant, founded in the 1950s by a Greek immigrant and named after him. After the 2005 CPA it sparked a kind of "Old Khartoum" revival by staging live music. Towards the town-quarter of Khartoum 2, still operates the Hellenic Athletic Club, which is particularly popular with Western expats and commonly known as the Greek Club. Alexandra Pateraki is the president of both the Hellenic Community and the Hellenic Club.

The most present Greek legacy in Sudanese culture though is "the classic childhood drink" of Pasgianos, an ultra-sweet carbonated soft drink which is only available in Sudan. The unique flavour was invented by George Dimitri Pasgianos, who immigrated around 1930 and merged in the recipe of the fizzy drink Greek and Sudanese tastes. Throughout the decades it proved resilient against global competitors of soft drinks in the countrywide market and was sold in 1999 by its Greek-Sudanese owners to the Haggar Holding Company, one of the biggest trading corporations of Sudan. The multi-award-winning Sudanese writer Leila Aboulela has incorporated Pasgianos in her 2015 novel "The Kindness of Enemies", when the narrator gets a bottle from her mother: "The bottle was warm and I drank it all in one go."