Turkish Minister for Forest and Water Affairs Veysel Eroglu vehemently disputed the scientific capacity of NASA officials during a parliamentary discussion in Turkey’s national assembly on the effects of drought in the eastern Mediterranean. Eroglu said the studies and scientific surveys done by Turkey were of much higher quality and reliability than those of NASA. According to data released by NASA, the eastern Mediterranean region was hit by the worst drought for the past 900 years. Eroglu doubted the accuracy of these findings exclaiming ‘Who does NASA think it is, we are better than them. They might have satellites, but we have Gokturk’. He claimed that NASA monitored global effects while Turkish data was more focused on the land mass of Turkey.