If there was any doubt about Turkey’s true intentions in the eastern Mediterranean, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu gave a clear answer from Bratislava today, where the GLOBSEC Bratislava Forum on Security, European Affairs, Energy, Economy, and Strategic Communications is being held. Even as the Turkish top diplomat is scheduled to meet on the sidelines of the event with his Greek counterpart, Nikos Dendias, he effectively undermined the meeting describing the Greek positions for the delimitation of sea zones in the Eastern Mediterranean as “maximalist”.
Shortly after Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan warned that “Turkey will never retreat in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean”, Cavusoglu undertook to present Ankara’s revisionist strategy in even greater detail.
The Turkish Foreign Minister used the “GlobSec 2020” forum to propagate Turkish positions in front of an audience that included, among others, the German Foreign Ministers of Germany, France, and many other EU member states.
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Dendias – Cavusoglu agree to set a date for the exploratory talks
Speaking unequivocally in a section entitled “Turkey’s role in regional and global security”, Cavusoglu presented specific maps with Greek and Turkish views on the delimitation of maritime zones in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean, with the obvious intention to de-legitimise the Greek positions, attempting to spread Turkish claims to an international audience.
The Turkish Foreign Minister made special reference to Kastellorizo, presenting a card with three maps explaining the Turkish positions on the Greek island on the southwest coast of Turkey which stands in the way of Turkish foreign policy and its interests in the region.
Cavusoglu described Kastellorizo as a “tiny island”, claiming that it is not possible for an island of 10 square kilometers to give Greece a continental shelf and an Exclusive Economic Zone with a total area of 40,000 square kilometres. He went so far as to claim that the seismic surveys carried out by Oruc Reis from August 10th to mid-September were carried out in areas that Ankara has declared to the UN as belonging to a Turkish continental shelf.
According to diplomatic sources, Nikos Dendias and the Turkish Foreign Minister agreed to set a date for the 61st round of Greek-Turkish exploratory contacts. The Greek Foreign Minister expressed Greece’s reaction to the unilateral, despite the UN Security Council resolutions, Turkish decision to extend the access permit to the Varosia coastal front in occupied Cyprus.
