President Milanović Visits European Southern Observatory in Chile

During his official visit to the Republic of Chile and his stay in the Antofagasta Region in the north of Chile, the President of the Republic Zoran Milanović visited the Paranal Observatory in the Atacama Desert.

Under the expert guidance of the head of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and associates, President Milanović toured the largest optical-infrared observatory in the southern hemisphere, the second largest such facility in the world. Paranal Observatory is the home of ESO’s Very Large Telescope and four small dome-shaped auxiliary telescopes.

ESO is an intergovernmental organisation established in 1962 supported by 16 European countries (Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom), host country Chile and strategic partners. ESO has more than 750 staff from more than 30 countries and countless more collaborators worldwide who design, build and operate world-class observatories on the ground. The telescopes are used by astronomers worldwide.

All of ESO’s telescopes are located in the Chilean Atacama Desert, a place with unique conditions to observe the sky. ESO operates three observing sites in Chile: La Silla, Paranal and Chajnantor. In addition, ESO is building “the world’s biggest eye on the sky” – ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope, located on Cerro Armazones, which will be operated as part of the Paranal Observatory. Today, President Milanović will tour the construction site of the new telescope.

ESO’s headquarters are located in Garching, close to Munich in Germany, where it conceives and develops cutting-edge telescope technologies together with industry partners, and educates both children and adults in the visitor centre and planetarium, the ESO Supernova.

On his visit to the Paranal Observatory President Milanović was accompanied by the Head of the Office of the President of the Republic Orsat Miljenić, Adviser to the President of the Republic for Foreign and European Policy Neven Pelicarić, Member of the Croatian Parliament and Head of the Croatia-Chile Interparliamentary Friendship Group Natalija Martinčević and Ambassador of the Republic of Croatia to the Republic of Chile Mira Martinec.

PHOTO: Office of the President of the Republic of Croatia / Tomislav Bušljeta