ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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Rodis Kanakaris – Rufus (1924 – 12 October 1972) was a Greek diplomat and writer, who developed significant resistance action during the Colonels' Junta.

Biographical data
He was born in 1924 and was the son of Lucas Kanakaris - Roufos, MP and minister, and Helen Papagerakopoulou. On his father's side he came from an old family of politicians of Patras and was the grandson of Thanos Kanakaris - Roufos, mayor of Patras and minister, great-grandson of Benizelos Roufos as well as Aristomenes Provelegios, politician and academic. He studied law at the University of Athens. During the Occupation he joined the organization of the Holy Brigade as well as the RAN (Romylia-Avlon Islands), coming in conflict with members of the Single Panhellenic Youth Organization (ECON) at the University of Athens. He was a close friend of Kitsu Maltese, whose murder marked him. In 1944 he joined the Holy Company of the National Association of Higher Schools (ESA) and then the National Democratic Hellenic Association (EDES) of Napoleon Zerva.

In 1949 he entered the diplomatic corps. He served as a diplomatic representative in Vienna (1952 – 1954), Nicosia (1954 – 1956) and Paris (1960 – 1964). During his tenure in Paris he enrolled in Sorbonne for a doctoral thesis, which he did not complete, on the subject of the Athenian uprising against the Romans during 88-86 BC. In 1967 he served in the central service of the foreign ministry bearing the rank of Consultant Embassy I. With the establishment of the Colonels' Junta, after first proposing, without success, to his colleagues to resign grouply, he requested six months' leave, to be fired from Junta permanently in 1969 due to a self-confident absence from the service.

As a deputy consul in Nicosia he collaborated with the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (EECA) and George Grivas, with whom he kept correspondence, as well as Archbishop Makarios, with whom he worked intensively during the negotiations with the governor of Cyprus, Sir John Harding, largely shaping Makarios' tactics. It is also claimed that he was the one who recommended to Makarios to ask the resignation of Greek Foreign Minister Spyros Theotokis from Constantine Karamanlis. In March 1959, although stationed in Athens, he will be invited to take part in the committee in London that had been invited to elaborate the details of the Zurich agreement, remaining there until April 1960.

He was also a close friend of George Seferis and Theophilus D. Fragopoulos.

He died in Kolonaki, on 12 October 1972, at the age of 48, having contracted cancer, and was buried in the first cemetery of Athens. He was married to Arietta Scanavi, with whom they had two sons, Luke, lawyer, and Thanos, musician. Three years after his death the Greek state honored him with M