By Penelope Galliou

No retreat from national red lines is Athens’ steadfast response to Ankara’s new challenges, with Kyriakos Mitsotakis from Cyprus clarifying the landscape of relations between the two sides of the Aegean, half a century after the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. The Greek prime minister, from Megalonisos, clarified the landscape in view of the prospects of the resumption of talks for the solution of the Cyprus issue, without any retreat from our country’s fixed positions, but with a willingness to negotiate with a Tayyip Erdogan, who appeared once again to oscillate between the need to shake off the image and profile of a disruptive leader of the wider Eastern Mediterranean region and his internal needs to publicly make recommendations to the Greek prime minister for Defense Minister Nikos Dendias.

It may be that once again, as expected, the Turkish president’s fiestas of bigotry and big-mouthed provocations were not missing either, but what Athens keeps from the Turkish attitude is that Tayyip Erdogan restrained himself in softer tones than he was used to in past in corresponding black anniversaries for Hellenism and the repeated threats it launched, to the delight of its domestic and nationalist audience. Tons, which, according to Athens, were kept at a level that would not affect Greek-Turkish relations at such a point, canceling the efforts made so far and putting the ongoing Greek-Turkish dialogue on “freeze” once again.

According to government sources, it is estimated that the recent meeting of Kyriakos Mitsotakis with Tayyip Erdogan in Washington, on the sidelines of the NATO Summit, helped in this direction, as well as all the contacts between the two sides throughout the previous period, which maintain the necessary – at least – level between the two sides. Reinforcingly, it is also estimated that the intention of G.G. of the UN Antonio Guterres that there will soon be developments in the restart of the dialogue on the Cyprus issue.

However, as the Greek side has repeatedly demonstrated, under no circumstances will it tolerate insults and interventions from the other side of the Aegean, such as the one against Defense Minister Nikos Dendias on the occasion of Greece’s self-evident and declared position on Turkey’s invasion of Cyprus which expressed and condemned “the Turkish Cypriot fiestas of shame and the profane illegal presence for half a century of the Turkish Army of Occupation in Cyprus”. Driven by this, the Turkish president launched an attack against the Greek Minister of Defense, calling on Kyriakos Mitsotakis to put his minister in his place in order to receive the harsh response of Athens through the government representative, declaring that “those who try to discover alleged divisions are in vain among government officials”.

“The Prime Minister clearly repeated the national positions: We do not accept fait accompli, our aim is to have a Republic of Cyprus with one sovereignty, one international personality and one citizenship in a Bizonal Bicommunal Federation, in a single State, without a foreign army of occupation, without anachronistic guarantees” , Mr. Marinakis said in his announcement. “It is obvious that these views are shared and expressed, in their entirety, by all the members of the Greek Government,” he stressed, while according to Mr. Marinakis, “the fact that we are discussing with Turkey does not mean that we agree and much more that we are backing down . The opposite. And that every threat to Cyprus becomes a threat to the whole EU”.