Greek determination against the Turkish backsliding

by

Turkey continues to backtrack and while on the one hand it expresses the intention of Hulusi Akar to meet with Nikos Panagiotopoulos on the sidelines of the meeting of the NATO Defense Ministers in Brussels, at the same time the aggressive crescendo continues

By Penelope Galliou

With the ongoing internationalization barrage of Turkish revisionism and Ankara’s challenges“taking advantage” of every international stage and forum insists that Athens respond, while sending a clear message of determination and readiness after the KYSEA meeting under the prime minister.

Reinforcement of deterrent power, further shielding of land and sea borders and diplomatic and operational vigilance was reaffirmed during the meeting of the Government Council where the course of implementation of armament programs, the approval of new ones, as well as the upgrading of systems of the Armed Forces and the Coast Guard which gives daily and continuously his own battle in the Aegean against Turkey’s plans and instrumentalization of the immigration issue.

On the carpet of KYSEA empowerment and updating were also introduced of the Civil Protection program “AEGIS” and according to information the upgrade of Civil Protection and procedures for the procurement of additional Canadairs in the next years, two through RescEu and another five with co-financing of European and national resources, were considered.

According to the same information, at the same time, extensive reference was made to the progress of the projects to expand and upgrade the fence in Evros, as well as dealing with the rings that operate both on the land borders of Evros and in the Aegean, transporting illegal immigrants into the country.

Nikos Dendias for his part, he informed about the talks he had with his Egyptian counterpart with the aim of coordinating Athens-Cairo against the possibility of challenging the Greek-Egyptian EEZ by means of the Ankara-Tripoli agreement on hydrocarbons on the basis of the illegal and non-existent Turkish-Libyan memorandum.

As stated by government representative the continued provocative behavior of Turkey in our region and the south-eastern Mediterranean was discussed. “Behavior that we deal with calmly and decisively,” he said. In fact, the environment created by the incendiary behavior and rhetoric of Turkey seems to have played a major role in the decision that the KYSEA no longer meets ad hoc but at regular intervals, at least every two months, evaluating and weighing factors and conditions and in order to have a better coordination.

The Turkish palinodes

Turkey at the same time continues to backtrack and while on the one hand it expresses an intention to meet the Turkish Minister of Defense Hulusi Akar with Nikos Panagiotopoulos on the sidelines of the meeting of the NATO Defense Ministers in Brussels, at the same time the aggressive crescendo continues, with the representative of the Turkish Presidency, Ibrahim Kalin, defiantly asserting the sovereign rights of Greece south of Crete. “The claims of the Greeks have no value, because here we are talking about an agreement that has been made between Turkey and Libya. When a similar agreement was made between Greece and Egypt no one said: “but where is Greece and where is Egypt”.

The Greek side, however, insists on not losing an opportunity to expose the Turkish provocation, with the ND Member of Parliament and international expert Tasos Hatzivasiliou to be reported from the Council of Europe forum in Strasbourg.
“We have serious challenges and unprecedented threats against the sovereignty of Greece and especially against our islands. And the same is true in relation to Cyprus. Revisionism is a danger to regional stability.
I urge you all to look at a map and find out the limits of the illegal agreement on the maritime zones that they signed with Libya”, emphasized Mr. Hatzivasiliou.

Turkish aggression was also included in the “menu” of the meeting of Nikos Panagiotopoulos with G.G. of NATO Jens Stoltenberg on the sidelines of the alliance’s Defense Ministers’ Summit, which lasted longer than the suffocating fifteen minutes that was originally planned, and issues related to security and peace were on the discussion table, while Mr. Panagiotopoulos emphasized Greece’s assistance in the war of Ukraine and condemned any revisionism that causes destabilization in Europe.

You May Also Like

Recommended for you