For the first time in its 15 years of hosting OXI Day events, the Washington OXI Day Foundation held its annual awards gala at Washington National Cathedral. Pews gave way to dinner tables for more than 240 guests in the very space where American presidents have prayed to mark their inaugurations and gathered to bid farewell to their predecessors.
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This year’s OXI Courage Awards honored Iranian artist Toomaj Salehi and, posthumously, Ukrainian journalist Victoria Roshchyna, who lost her life at 27. “Despite unimaginable threats, they refused to be silenced,” said Andy Manatos, the Foundation’s founder. Salehi was imprisoned and held in solitary confinement. The Dalai Lama received the Metropolitan Chrysostomos Award, which had been presented to him earlier in Dharamshala, India. The Greek prime minister congratulated the honorees in a video message.
Antonis Alexandridis, Greece’s ambassador to the United States, drew a connection between Greece’s defiance on October 28, 1940, and the experience of Greek Americans. “We proved once again that the word ‘impossible’ doesn’t belong in the Greek vocabulary,” he said. He spoke of the courage it took for Greeks in America to endure hardship, rebuild their lives and create something larger than themselves.
In his keynote address, George Logothetis, executive chairman of Libra Group and chairman of Libra Philanthropies, called on each person to stand beside those facing injustice. He closed by asking how we might answer when pressed to compromise our principles. “May our reply be: NEVER, NON, OXI.”
Guests included representatives of the Ukrainian and Cypriot diplomatic missions and retired Greek-American four-star General Andrew Poppas. The Foundation also recognized Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian democracy activist and former OXI Courage Award recipient who was in attendance, for his continuing advocacy for democracy in Russia.
