The senior adviser to the Turkish President Yigit Bulut said that “those that dream with game-boards to divide Cyprus from the Turkey must be ready to pay the price that Turkey payed with its hero’s blood”. He added that if EU, Britain and Germany want to take Cyprus they should be ready to pay the price.

He also expressed his “sadness” because Mustafa Akinci said that “we [the Turkish-Cypriot community or constituent state] can enter the EU and Turkey can follow. We don’t need the EU. The EU hasn’t kept the promise it gave to Turkey about the visa. Are we supposed to be visiting Cyprus with a visa?”

It is not the first time someone close to Erdogan makes inflammatory statements against Greece, Cyprus or the EU. But it is rather worrying that these statements are made much more frequently than in the past.