Vardis Vardinogiannis

Vardinogiannis was born on 4 December 1933 in Episkopi, Rethymno, Crete, the son of a farmer family from Agios Ioannis, Sfakia who had moved to Episkopi in the early 20th century. Vardinogiannis was in elementary school during the Second World War when Crete was occupied by the Germans. In the postwar years he moved to Athens, where he entered the Hellenic Naval Academy, from which he graduated in 1955 as an officer of the Greek Navy. He was forcibly retired and exiled on a remote island for opposing the Greek junta that ruled from 1967 to 1974. ==Business interests==

Vardinogiannis joined his family's enterprise in the 1970s and helped it expand. The firm's growth was strengthened by his entering into a partnership with Aramco in the 1990s. The Vardinogiannis brothers owned the merchant ship Ioanna V which, in 1966, broke the United Nations-imposed and British-enforced embargo on Rhodesia by bringing in oil to the Portuguese Mozambique port of Beira, which was connected with landlocked Rhodesia by a pipeline. This move yielded huge profits to the Group. In subsequent years the four brothers continued to extend the group, staying away from publicity. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the group expanded in the new independent states of the Eastern Bloc, obtaining contracts for the opening of new highways in Ukraine and Georgia. Together with George Bobolas, Christos Lambrakis, Christos Tegopoulos and Vardis Vardinogiannis, Alafouzos was one of the five founding members of the Teletypos company who created the first private Greek television channel, Mega TV. This began broadcasting in November 1989. ==Personal life and death==

In 1961, Vardinogiannis married Marianna Bournaki and had five children, He was saved while inside his highly armored car. Vardis Vardinogiannis and his wife Marianna were among the founders of the Robert Kennedy Human Rights Leadership Council, along with Bill Clinton and other world leaders. The wedding of Rory Kennedy and Mark Bailey was celebrated in Vardinogiannis's Greek mansion in upscale Ekali Athens. The 1993 wedding of Rory's older sister, Courtney Kennedy to Irishman Paul Hill was celebrated on the luxury yacht Varmar owned by Vardinogiannis. Vardinogiannis died in Athens on 12 November 2024, at the age of 90. ==References==