Cyprus

Although successive Greek governments and the military for decades have been aware of Ankara’s objective of splitting half-and-half the underwater wealth in hydrocarbons in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean with Greece and now with the Republic of Cyprus, Turkey has never expressed its agenda directly at the highest levels. That has ben patently obvious […]

'As we have stated in these past letters, to the UN, that its Convention on the Law of the Sea states that regardless of their size islands have sea zones just as land zones and have full sovereign rights.

All that has been happening in the last few months on the Greek islands do not point to a responsible stance on Turkey’s part.

The curtailing of refugee and migrant flows from the Turkish coast to the Greek islands was obviously also at the top of the Greek PM’s agenda.

Dendias extolled the Greece-Italy partnership both on energy issues and migration.

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci are due to have a rare meeting in Nicosia on Aug. 9 in a bid to jumpstart talks on a Cyprus problem solution.

Anastasiades said that he discussed with Mitsotakis ways to confront Turkish provocations in Cyprus’ EEZ.

The EIB, which is Turkey’s biggest single lender, has spent between 0.4 billion euros ($446 million) and 2.2 billion euros ($2.45 billion) a year in the country over the last three years, while nothing has been invested so far in 2019.

Cyprus has rejected Turkish-Cypriot leader’ Mustafa Akinci’s proposal for the two communities to co-manage the island's gas and oil deposits prior to a Cyprus settlement.

After the failed 2016 coup against him, Erdogan’s decisions have completely undermined Turkey’s EU course.

EU foreign ministers noted Turkey’s illegal drilling in Cyprus’ EEZ and suspended talks on the EU-Turkey air transport agreement and other high-level EU-Turkey dialogues.

As the bloc needs Turkey in matters such as security and migration, an EU diplomat involved in the latest discussions told Reuters any future sanctions would be limited.

The ministry’s condemnation came just one day after Mitsotakis discussed the regional situation for 20 minutes with US Vice President Mike Pence and following a stern State Department statement criticising Ankara.

The summit conclusions reaffirmed the decision of the 22 March, 2018, EU summit’s statement “strongly condemning Turkey's continued illegal actions in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean Sea.”

For the time being, Ankara has not indicated an intention to drill in blocks of Cyprus’ EEZ for which Nicosia has awarded concessions to Western oil companies (ExxonMobil, Total, Eni).

The Greek government’s statements of condemnation obviously do not address the issue, nor does a merely formal alignment of the government and the opposition suffice to confront Ankara’s provocations.

There is very little the EU, which lacks a Union army, can do in the situation except perhaps for imposing some kind of economic sanctions.

Russia has so far kept a stance of equal distances between Ankara and Nicosia.

“In line with our established approach, fully composed, we will not be dragged into actions that lead to tension in the region,” Cypriot Defence Minister Savvas Angelides said.

Speaking of a “major foreign ministry scandal”, Yalim maintained that the coordinates effectively handed over to Greece 92,000kms of continental shelf and five islands that he said belong to Turkey.