HELLENIC OLYMPIC COMMITTEE

Greece at the Mediterranean Games

Greece has traditionally never missed a Mediterranean Games since their birth. Greece made its debut at the Alexandria Mediterranean Games in 1951. The first Mediterranean Games were hosted in Alexandria, Egypt in 1951.
There are six other countries that have also participated in all the M.G. that have been held until now; Italy, Spain, France, Turkey, Lebanon and Malta. Egyptian Mohamed Taher Pasha (1897-1970), former vice-president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), was the man who first envisaged the Mediterranean Games.
With the support of Greece’s Ioannis Ketseas, Pasha made his proposal on the sidelines of the London1948 Games. IOC made Pasha’s and Ketseas’ dream come true and the first Mediterranean games were hosted in Alexandria, in 1951.
The plan for setting up the International Committee of the Mediterranean Games (ICMG) was submitted in 1955, in Barcelona, at the second Mediterranean Games. The committee officially began its operations June 16, 1961 with Ioannis Ketseas as Secretary General. Epaminondas Petralias, Nikos Filaretos, Minos Kyriakou and Isidoros Kouvelos succeded Ketseas at the same post.
Until 1967, only men were allowed to take part in the Games. It was in 1991, in Athens, that the International Committee of the Mediterranean Games decided to change the time the Mediterranean Games are held. From then, the time the Games take place a year after the summer Olympics.