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It will not end reliance on imports; and the eastern Med will stay tense
FOR MONTHS Turkish drilling ships had scavenged the seabed of the eastern Mediterranean for energy sources, sailing into disputed waters and provoking a standoff with Cyprus, Greece and the EU. Yet it was in the murky depths of the Black Sea that Turkey ended up striking gas. On August 21st the …
On July 24, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan joined thousands of worshippers in the streets around the historic Hagia Sophia in Istanbul for a doubly symbolic moment. Surrounded by a swarm of politicians, soldiers, security forces and imams, the Turkish leader made his way into the giant, former Byzantine cathedral through doors once hammered open by conquering Ottoman soldiers in 1453. Inside, he read …
Not for the first time, fellow NATO members Turkey and Greece are at each other’s throats. But this time the flare-up between the historic rivals is especially dangerous and unpredictable, observers warn, as the neighbors’ warships patrol disputed Mediterranean waters thought to be rich in oil and gas.
Turkey, led by authoritarian President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, appears eager to press its long-standing objections to the …
Austria has caught a person spying for Turkey on its soil, the interior minister said today, in a revelation that threatens to further strain relations between Ankara and Vienna.
During a televised news conference, Austrian Interior Minister Karl Nehammer said that an individual had been “recruited by the Turkish secret service to spy on other Turkish citizens or Austrian citizens with a Turkish migration background to then …
The number of inflammatory and threatening statements made by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan over recent months has been escalating at a meteoric rate, and due to their hollow nature, they have become a source of ridicule across the globe. Hardly a day passes without a new threatening statement made by Erdogan towards Greece, the EU or countries in the Middle East.
The tone of …
Even a kerfuffle can reveal a strategic blunder. In December 2019, the New York Times editorial board taped an interview with former Vice President Joe Biden. A segment dealing with US-Turkish relations did not make the final cut, but eight months later, on August 15, 2020, it surfaced on the internet and sparked outrage in Turkey. Biden was especially critical of Turkey’s policies towards …
Turkey will not tolerate “piracy or banditry’’ in the Aegean and Mediterranean regions, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Monday.
The country, which has the longest coastline in the Mediterranean region. will not be confined to its shores, state-run Anadolu new agency cited Erdoğan as saying in the northern province of Giresun at an event kick-staring the fishing season in the region.
“As the Turkish nation, we …
How the looming end of a 100-year-old treaty exposes the existential paranoia at the heart of Erdogan’s foreign policy. – OCTOBER 2, 2014
While American commentators debate whether Turkey will join U.S. President Barack Obama’s coalition against the Islamic State, some Turkish pundits are looking ahead to more serious foreign-policy challenges — like what will happen in 2023 when the Treaty of Lausanne expires and …
Mining area has more than tripled since March 2019, NGO says.Officials redouble work on mining camps as oil output plummets
U.S. sanctions and a collapsing oil industry are prompting Venezuela to step up its push into gold mining, including in protected areas of the Amazon.
The amount of land used for mining has more than tripled since March last year, according to a study by local non-profit …
By over-projecting its power potential, Ankara finds itself on a conflictual trajectory, on a case-by-case basis, with the interests of other major or regional powers such as the US, Russia, France, Italy, Israel, Egypt, and Germany.
The summer of 2020 has been unlike any summer in recent history. Usually, during the long summer months, a sort of informal moratorium appears between Greece and Turkey so …
Observers fear a mistake or miscalculation could lead to military conflict between the Nato members
As warships bristling with 21st century weapons systems prowled the eastern Mediterranean, Turkey’s president drew on a rather earlier era to underline his latest round of sabre-rattling towards Greece.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan chose the anniversary of a battle that took place near 1,000 years ago as an opportunity to warn the …
Turkey’s Defense Ministry published a video on Friday alleging to show that its F-16s confronted Greek F-16s as the Greeks were heading from Crete toward an area where Turkey had declared a naval drill. Tensions are running high between the two NATO members. NATO head Jens Stoltenberg phoned Turkey’s president and begged Ankara to do “de-confliction” with Athens.
Meanwhile, Egypt and Greece ratified a maritime …
CAIRO – 29 August 2020: Metin Külünk, a former lawmaker from Turkey’s ruling AK Party, has released a map of “Greater Turkey” that goes back to the era of the Seljuk Empire and its defeat of the Byzantine Empire in the 1071 Battle of Manzikert.
Külünk, who is close to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, published the map on Twitter to mark the anniversary of …
On Europe’s periphery, tensions involving an array of competing countries are rising. The brewing crisis in Belarus has sparked fears of an armed Russian intervention. And a standoff in the eastern Mediterranean is pitting Turkey against Greece, Cyprus and France.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that Russian forces were ready to enter neighboring Belarus “if necessary,” apparently following a request from embattled Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko. …
PARIS (Reuters) – French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that he had taken a tough stance over the summer with regard to Turkey’s actions in the eastern Mediterranean, setting red lines because Ankara respects actions not words.
French President Emmanuel Macron, wearing a protective face mask, visits a site of pharmaceutical group Seqens, a global leader on the production of active pharmaceutical ingredients, to …
NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) — Greek and Turkish warships are testing each other’s naval prowess while political leaders in Athens and Ankara probe each other’s resolve over a search for hydrocarbon reserves in east Mediterranean waters that each nation claims.
Despite the saber rattling, there’s doesn’t appear to be a real appetite for war. But neither nation is ready to back down and look weak.
Greece and …
PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday that he had taken a tough stance over the summer with regard to Turkey’s actions in the eastern Mediterranean, setting red lines because Ankara respects actions not words.
Relations between France and Turkey have soured in recent months over Ankara’s role in NATO, Libya and the Mediterranean.
Macron has called for the EU to show solidarity with …
The Eastern Mediterranean has become an increasingly crowded space, between precarious refugee crossings from Libya to Europe, the flow of arms and mercenaries in the other direction, and Russia’s new naval hub at the Syrian port of Tartus.
So when a Turkish seismic vessel began carrying out surveys in waters where Greece also claims jurisdiction, shadowed by Turkish warships, it added another dangerous element to …
No one should fool themselves about the nature of Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s vision for Turkey. It’s an imperialist project that would see Turkey’s hegemony stretch from the Mediterranean Sea and Libya all the way to Iran.
Erdogan’s plans for his country’s expansion are evident in the current stand-off in the eastern Mediterranean between Turkey and Greece. Turkish frigates are accompanying a research vessel, the Oruc Reis, …
On 6 July, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borell travelled to Turkey to discuss problems in Turkish-European relations with Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, the country’s foreign minister. The background of the meeting consisted of tensions in Turkish-French relations and the upcoming Foreign Affairs Council (13 July) where EU ministers were to discuss the future of relations with Turkey. The Borell-Çavuşoğlu …
The celebration commemorating the anniversary of the 1071 Seljuk victory over Byzantine armies turned into a display of nationalist frenzy, which indicates Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s increasing need to consolidate his support base by expansionist and aggressive foreign policy.
The Battle of Manzikert took place 949 year ago. In 1071, the Seljuks, the Ottomans’ predecessors, defeated the mainly Greek forces of the Byzantine Empire …
In this exclusive broadcast, Edgar Şar hosts public international law experts Yunus Emre Açıkgönül and Nicholas Ioannides to discuss Turkish and Greek claims on how maritime delimitation should be carried out in the Eastern Mediterranean from a legal perspective.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhLbIhKQ7LE
Conflict over drilling rights to massive natural-gas deposits in the eastern Mediterranean is becoming increasingly militarized, risking a conflict between two NATO members.
BRUSSELS — An escalating dispute between Greece and Turkey over energy resources in the eastern Mediterranean is fast becoming militarized, raising the risks of a clash among NATO allies.
Foreign Minister Heiko Maas of Germany, who visited Greece and Turkey this week urging …
Turkey is protesting the UAE for establishing diplomatic relations with Israel—even though Ankara has had diplomatic relations with Israel for the past 71 years. If the UAE, as Ankara argues, has betrayed the “Palestinian cause” just by having diplomatic relations with Israel, then Turkey has been betraying the “Palestinian cause” since 1949.
These days, Turkey’s foreign policy calculus, especially when it involves matters surrounding Israel, …
The subject of maritime boundaries has been discussed and studied for decades. More recently, gas discoveries emerged in Egyptian, Israeli, and Cypriot waters. Exploiting other potential gas discoveries in the area is the current focus of Ankara.
Diversification from its current energy dependence on Russian and Iranian gas would indeed be beneficial to Turkey. But the recent drop in gas prices and the large availability …
HASAKAH, Syria — Co-Chair of the Local Administration and Municipalities Authority in the Democratic Autonomous Administration (DAA) of North and East Syria Joseph Lahdo confirmed that the DAA is undertaking alternative projects to provide water for Hasakah Canton and called on international parties to put an end to the violations of the Turkish occupation.
The current water crisis has been ongoing since 13 August when …
An effort to mediate a thaw between Greece and Turkey was “smooth” on the Greek side but “really hard on the Turkish side,” German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer told the European Union’s high representative for foreign affairs, Josep Borrell, in an off-record discussion in Berlin on Wednesday.
In a video published on Wednesday from a press conference at the informal meeting of European defense ministers …
For a very long time our Holy Land suffered from covetousness from its surrounding political rivals due to its geopolitically important via maris.
In our present world, Israel treads carefully as it seeks world acceptance, being squeezed in the Eastern Mediterranean between two strategic locations, the Suez Canal, important in world trade, and the Bosporus, a key naval strait in NATO’s rivalry with Russia.
The local …
The EU member states “must continue to show solidarity with Greece and Cyprus in the Eastern Mediterranean crisis,” Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu said on Wednesday in a Twitter message one day before the informal Gymnich meeting of EU diplomats, scheduled for Thursday and Friday in Berlin.
“On tensions in #EastMed, tomorrow @ #Gymnich in Berlin I’ll reiterate that #EU Member States must continue to show …
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is seen in a file photo. ‘As a rogue, he challenges us to declare what we stand for and who we stand with,’ the author says of the Turkish strongman.
Who in the West knows what to do about Recep Tayyip Erdogan? He’s no longer who we hoped he was. He challenges what we stand for – our norms and …
The Gülen movement is one of two marginalized groups in present-day Turkey along with the with Kurds. However, the situation was quite different 10 years ago. The people who launched a fierce campaign to “finish off” the Gülen group in today’s Turkey once considered it their closest ally.
The politicians who currently rule the country used to send their own children to schools run by …
In June 2006, Cem Gürdeniz, the head of the Turkish Navy’s planning staff, outlined a foreign policy concept that interested few at the time because it seemed overly audacious and aggressive. In a speech he gave in Ankara, Gürdeniz called for Turkey’s expansion in the Mediterranean region, saying the government needed redraw its borders, taking up arms if necessary, to secure the country’s economic …
Greece and Turkey are planning rival naval exercises off Crete amid an escalating row over energy claims in the Eastern Mediterranean.
The two neighbours have seen frequent flare-ups, but this latest spat over gas reserves and maritime rights has prompted fears that tensions could escalate further. Several other countries have stakes in the dispute and the two Nato allies are engaged in a war of …
Russian increased naval activity in the eastern Mediterranean is sounding alarm bells for the Turkish military and the British military bases on Cyprus.
The Russian Navy has gathered 9 vessels between Cyprus and Syria, four of which are surface warships and three are submarines.
What worries other players in the region (namely the British and the Turks) more, is the fact that the Russians are maintaining …
Economic shambles, a static political base, brewing conflict in the Mediterranean? According to Erdogan’s alarming new propaganda video, the ‘New Turkey’ has the answers: the flag, the faith and the armed forces. Enjoy!
Source: Turkey’s Presidential Communications Directorate
In a column for TR724, Professor Mehmet Efe Çaman has written an article that would surely shock most of his readers as he urges Turks to understand that the sovereignty of Greece’s Aegean islands are not under question. In it, the professor urges for a de-escalation of tensions between Greece and Turkey, arguing that Turkey is an expansionist power and that their cries on …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8FF33W3STM
Turkey says its natural gas find in the Black Sea will likely be followed by further discoveries, altering the geopolitics of energy trade in its region.
President Recip Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman Ibrahim Kalin spoke exclusively to Bloomberg’s Turkey Bureau Chief Onur Ant in Istanbul on Saturday.
The father of Turkey’s controversial new maritime doctrine told AFP that France’s decision to send warships to help Greece out in its Mediterranean standoff with Ankara was adding “fuel to the fire”.
While he might be retired, the “Blue Homeland” vision that Rear Admiral Cem Gurdeniz helped craft over a decade ago is being turned into reality by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan today.
A 62-year-old …
The sides are now discussing “the financial arrangement of implementing the contract,”Head of Russia’s state arms seller Rosoboronexport Alexander Mikheyev
MOSCOW, August 23. /TASS/. A contract on the delivery of the second batch of S-400 anti-aircraft missile systems to Turkey has been signed and the sides are discussing the contract’s financial terms, Head of Russia’s state arms seller Rosoboronexport Alexander Mikheyev told reporters on Sunday.
“The …
Having already emasculated the 96-pound weaklings of the Eunuch Union like he was wielding a Burdizzo, Turkey’s Sultan Recep Tayyip Erdogan thought he could do the same to Greek Premier Kyriakos Mitsotakis, who may look like a kid you can bully in the schoolyard and take his lunch money but he’s got what they no longer have.
Mitsotakis, he of the privileged pedigree upbringing and …
AT THIS TIME of year the eastern Mediterranean evokes thoughts of holiday beaches. It has become a destination for superyachts avoiding covid-hit Spain. Unfortunately, this summer the region is also luring warships, as tensions rise between Greece and Turkey over disputed waters. A collision between Greek and Turkish frigates on August 12th was the worst confrontation between the two NATO allies since a face-off …
A plethora of countries is entangled in a string of disputes in the area
AS NAVAL BATTLES go, it was not a classic. The Kemal Reis, a Turkish frigate named after a 15th-century Ottoman admiral who tormented the Venetian fleet, was one of five escorts sent to protect the Oruc Reis, an exploration ship designed to hunt for undersea oil and gas. The Limnos, an …
Congressional leaders have blocked major U.S. arms sales to Turkey for almost two years in response to Ankara’s purchase of Russian S-400 missile systems, which the United States says threatens the F-35 fighter jet’s stealth capabilities. Turkey was subsequently ejected from the joint F-35 programme.
The congressional hold on arms sales, first reported last week by Defense News, has also impacted other key priorities of …
While the United States has imposed sanctions on Chinese officials and companies complicit in the abuse of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities, Beijing makes use of its deep pockets to buy the silence of majority Muslim countries around the world. The most shocking among these is Turkey, which shares not only religious but also ethnic affinity with China’s more than 12 million Uyghurs.
Turkish President …
A photograph made public by Kathimerini on Wednesday reveals the damage sustained to the right side of the stern of the Kemal Reis frigate during the collision on August 12.
Greek Defense Minister Nikos Panagiotopoulos on Tuesday congratulated the captain of the Greek frigate Limnos that accidentally collided with a Turkish ship during a standoff in the Eastern Mediterranean last week and indicated that Greece is …
The worsening stand-off in the eastern Mediterranean, frequently described as a gas conflict, has been gaining momentum. It may seem a strange time to be fighting over gas when prices remain in a slump due to weak demand and investors withdrawing. So what explains the escalating conflict between Turkey, Greece, Cyprus and Egypt, which is drawing in other regional and European powers?
Large reserves of …
The region’s powers and the West are facing off against Turkey—and Turkey is not going down without a fight.
In mid-August, a Turkish and a Greek warship collided in the Eastern Mediterranean, raising tensions in the most combustible naval stand-off the region has witnessed in 20 years. The crisis had started two days before, when Turkey deployed an energy exploration ship along with its naval …
MEXICO CITY (AP) — At first glance, they seem like an odd couple.
Yet Turkey, a Mediterranean power that often chafes at what it calls Western interventionism, and Venezuela on the Caribbean, rich in oil and gold but in perpetual crisis and under U.S. sanctions, have a few things in common.
There is an economic relationship; the murkier aspects have attracted the scrutiny of the U.S. …
Sir,
We too are deeply concerned by President Erdogan’s escalation of rhetoric and threat in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean (Erdogan’s Provocations, leading article, Aug 15). Positive developments in energy are an opportunity to build more productive and stable regional relationships, but require all parties to abide by international law. Other regional governments have shown their willingness to negotiate within the framework set by the UN …
The risk of conflict in the region grows by the day, but where is the UK?
The Government seems intent on drawing the Royal Navy into helping to tackle the growing number of migrants crossing the Channel from France. While ships have not yet been requested, the Ministry of Defence said “nothing was off the table” to stem the flow of small boats and dinghies. …
Turkey’s and Greece’s zero-sum game in dealing with the issues of maritime delimitation and jurisdiction has for decades posed a problem for the peace and stability in their region. The discovery of energy resources in the eastern Mediterranean has raised the stakes significantly. Mutual intransigence, but most importantly the growing power of ultranationalist officers in the Turkish state, is exacerbating tensions. Turkey’s Blue Homeland …
ISTANBUL—Two rival warships from Turkey and Greece have collided in the Eastern Mediterranean, officials from both countries said, amid a naval standoff triggered by Ankara’s recent decision to begin oil exploration in contested waters.
The incident, which occurred Wednesday and wasn’t publicized by either side, highlighted just how close to an open conflict the two North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies have come. It involved the …
As Turkey forcibly pushes ahead with its controversial activities in the Eastern Mediterranean, it is facing increasing opposition from regional states, many of which have formidable navies.
Turkey’s ongoing drilling for natural gas in the Republic of Cyprus’ economic exclusion zone (EEZ) has sparked widespread opposition in the wider region.
Ankara insists it has the right to drill for gas off Cyprus’ coast, claiming that those …
How a Turkish frigate tried to ram a Greek warship, causing the address to the nation by PM Mitsotakis – slpress.gr
There was an attempt to ram the Greek frigate “Lemnos”, shadowing the Oruc Reis escorted by the Turkish frigate Kemal Reis on Wednesday at noon. Through this action, Ankara tried to get rid of the obstacles posed by the Hellenic Navy in its effort …
France Sends Navy to Eastern Mediterranean Amid Turkey-Greece Standoff – WSJ
President Emmanuel Macron ordered French forces to the Eastern Mediterranean to provide military assistance to Greece, raising the stakes in France’s growing regional confrontation against an increasingly assertive Turkey.
France’s latest move in the region follows Mr. Macron’s trip last week to Beirut in the wake of an explosion that devastated the city.
By far the European …
On 6 August, Greece and Egypt signed an historic deal delimiting their Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs), an important development for stability in the Eastern Mediterranean. The deal was a result of many diplomatic contacts between the diplomatic and technical personnel of both countries and 13 rounds of bilateral negotiations. The EEZ deal promotes the national interests of both countries in various aspects and is …
Turkey is granting citizenship to senior operatives of a Hamas terrorist cell, the Telegraph has learned, raising fears that the Palestinian group will have greater freedom to plot attacks on Israeli citizens around the world.
Turkish identity papers seen by the Telegraph show that at least one of 12 senior Hamas members, who are using the country as a base of operations, has received Turkish …
Can international arbitration and mediation with its neighbors help Greece turn its energy challenges into opportunities in the Eastern Mediterranean?
The discovery of natural gas resources since 2009 in the Eastern Mediterranean has enhanced the region’s strategic energy significance and raised the possibility of multilateral cooperation and economic development. Greece’s continental shelf and Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) are part of the Levantine Basin, which, according …
“Israel expresses its full support and solidarity with Greece in its maritime zones and its right to delimit its Exclusive Economic Zone.”Foreign Ministry spokesman Lior Haiat
The Foreign Ministry on Wednesday said it “expresses its full support” for Greece amid an escalating dispute with neighboring Turkey over energy exploration in the Mediterranean Sea.
“Israel follows closely as tension arises in the Eastern Mediterranean,” Foreign Ministry spokesman …
And he won’t be able to keep the game going for much longer.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is not usually known as an economic innovator. But for the past year, his government has been running a high-stakes economic experiment. The test: How long can Turkey hide the fact that it is spending far beyond its means? Normally when governments spend more than they tax, …
A hundred years ago, French, British and Italian officials convened in a famous porcelain factory southwest of Paris to carve up the Ottoman Empire. The Treaty of Sèvres, signed Aug. 10, 1920, concluded months of fitful negotiations among the victors of World War I and paved the way for the remaking of the modern Middle East. It imposed terms on the defeated Ottomans widely seen as even more …
As Turkish ships searching for oil and gas off the Cypriot coast – near where French company Total has been authorized by the legitimate government to drill – Cyprus and Turkey signed a cooperation agreement in defense.
This lasted for three years, but occurred during a crucial period as Turkey continues to operate during the COVID-19 pandemic which has seen international companies allowed to back …
Dozens of Brotherhood websites launched from Turkey shared fabricated reports and photos attacking the agreement.
CAIRO: Turkey has sought help from the Muslim Brotherhood in Qatar and Ankara for its campaign against the Egyptian and Greek demarcation of their respective maritime borders.
The campaign began when the Turkish Foreign Ministry announced that it considered the agreement between Cairo and Athens “null,” and that the area covered …
More information about Greece is available on the Greece Page and from other Department of State publications and other sources listed at the end of this fact sheet.
U.S.-Greece Relations
The United States appointed its first Consul to Greece in 1837, following Greece’s independence from the Ottoman Empire, and established diplomatic relations with Greece in 1868. After World War II, the United States contributed hundreds of millions of …