Turkey is greatly annoyed by the fact that Greece has become an energy hub. It is a reality that cannot be denied. Turkey would like to have this position itself,” said, among others, Serres MP and Secretary of International Relations and EU of the New Democracy, Tasos Hadjivassiliou, speaking to OPEN on Tuesday morning, explaining that the upgraded energy position of our country is behind the intense rhetoric of tension expressed by Ankara lately.

Hadjivassiliou noted that “Greece is a country that is not heteronomous in its foreign and defense policy,” while noting that it is “at the very least blatant” for a neighboring country that has in place the theory of gray zones and the casus belli against Greece to talk about alleged Greek war preparations.

Analyzing the reasons for Turkey’s stance, he stressed that “the pipelines passing through Turkey are outside the central planning of Europe and the US for the continent’s energy security.”

At the same time, he pointed to the significant strengthening of our country’s deterrent power: “The fact that Greece has upgraded its Armed Forces to a very important level has also strengthened its diplomatic position, and Turkey understands this.”

He recalled that in the recent past “there were voices from the opposition saying that on the one hand Turkey got everything from Trump” and that “the Mitsotakis government is so compliant that Turkey will join SAFE”, to stress that “none of this has happened”. He said that “the strategies that Athens developed have produced positive results” and “Turkey is obviously irritated by our country’s choice to follow a path of responsibility.”

Turning to the broader geopolitical environment, Hadjivassiliou noted that “the world is changing rapidly” and that “Greece cannot stoically watch what is happening around it.” He cited as examples “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine”, “the Middle East, where the situation has not yet calmed down”, and “sub-Saharan Africa, where tension is lurking” and “may feed Europe with new waves of migrants”. In this context, he stressed that “Greece is rightly upgrading its strategic strength”, praising the policy of the government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

Referring to Libya, he stressed that “Ankara had invested in the partition of the country”, while Greece “is rightly talking today with both sides of Libya”, recalling the recent meeting between George Gerapetritis and Agila Saleh in Athens. He stressed that our country “has succeeded in interfering with the illegal Turkish-Libyan memorandum” with two central moves: the “exemplary agreement between Greece and Egypt” and “the government’s decision to apply the principle of the middle line and to carve out land south of Crete.”

Finally, he noted that “Greece is at the center of various multilateral cooperation schemes” in the Eastern Mediterranean, with Israel, Cyprus, Egypt and other critical actors, which confirms – as he said – that our country “is a force for stability, which interacts with confidence with all neighboring countries, has arguments, has positions based on law and safeguards its geopolitical position.”