The University of Nicosia inaugurated its new Athens campus on Thursday in the presence of Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who used the occasion to call for the revision of Article 16 of the Greek Constitution.
Christodoulides said the university had grown to around 14,000 students from 100 countries and predicted further expansion. “Today it is here in Athens, and you can be sure that very soon it will be in other European capitals,” he said. He described education as one of the most important sectors of the Cypriot economy, and said Cyprus now had approximately 40,000 foreign students since deciding in 2007 to invest in higher education. “We do not simply want foreign students. We want quality students,” he added.
He welcomed the recent passage of legislation allowing university branches to be established in Cyprus, and said the government was in talks with universities from Greece and abroad.
Mitsotakis said the campus met the highest standards his government had set when it opened the door to such institutions in Greece, and that the aim was for their number to reach 10. Describing Greece as a European exception due to its strict constitutional restrictions on higher education, he called for the revision of Article 16. “The time has come to act on what has been discussed for decades: to deem Article 16 open to revision, so that there is no longer any institutional question mark over the operation of such institutions in our country,” he said.
Article 16 of the Greek Constitution has long prohibited the establishment of private universities in Greece, making the country an outlier among EU member states. The legislation enabling foreign university branches — under which the University of Nicosia’s Athens campus operates — represents a workaround to that restriction. Full constitutional revision would remove the barrier entirely.
Programmes and campus development
The campus will offer programmes in Medicine, Law, Pharmacy, Psychology, Business Administration, Accounting, Marketing, Computer Science and Data Science in its first phase, marking the establishment of the first non-state Medical and Law School in Greece.
The campus will cover 150,000 square metres across three development phases, with the second phase expected by 2028 and the third by 2031.
Greek Education Minister Sofia Zacharaki and Cyprus Education Minister Dr Athena Michaelidou also attended the inauguration.
