‘Rapprochement should continue in Turkish-Greek ties despite crises’
09 October 2011, Sunday / İSTANBUL, ABDULLAH AYASUN
Turkey and Greece should maintain a spirit of rapprochement and continue improving their bilateral relations despite a crisis unfolding in the eastern Mediterranean over hydrocarbon exploration rights, Greek experts have said.
“It is very important to maintain the momentum so that our relations are defined overall by the continuity of progress, rather than by the way we move from one crisis to the other,” Alex Rondos, who was once an advisor to Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou when he was Greece’s foreign minister, told Sunday’s Zaman in an interview in İstanbul last week. Addressing the wide range of issues that could directly or indirectly impact bilateral relations between Greece and Turkey, Rondos said there has been increasing cooperation, discussion and openness to communication between the two countries over the past decade.
After decades of hostility stemming from disputes over Cyprus and territorial rights in the Aegean, Turkey and Greece initiated an unprecedented rapprochement in the wake of a devastating earthquake in northwestern Anatolia in 1999. Most of the disagreements have yet to be resolved even after dozens of rounds of closed-door “exploratory talks” between diplomats of the two countries, but political and people-to-people contacts have flourished nonetheless.
Ties were put to a new test when Greek Cyprus announced it would begin gas exploration off the island’s southern coast after it signed agreements to delineate undersea borders in the eastern Mediterranean with Israel, Lebanon and Egypt. US company Noble Energy and its Israeli partners are licensed by the Greek Cypriot government to drill for gas off the southern coast of Cyprus.
Turkey has strongly protested the Greek Cypriot gas exploration in the eastern Mediterranean, saying it also has rights to the region’s natural resources, as the country with the longest Mediterranean coast. Turkey also insists that the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC), whose state is not internationally recognized, should also be involved in hydrocarbon exploration. Despite Turkey’s warnings, Noble Energy recently began exploratory gas drilling off the coast of Cyprus, raising the tension between Turkey and Greek Cyprus and potentially between Turkey and Greece.
In response to the Greek Cypriot move, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and KKTC President Derviş Eroğlu signed an agreement in New York on the delineation of the eastern Mediterranean continental shelf between the two countries, paving the way for Turkish exploration for hydrocarbon reserves in the region. Turkey has also said its naval ships might escort exploration ships, raising the possibility of an armed conflict.
Papandreou, who, as the then-foreign minister of Greece, was one of the architects of the rapprochement with Turkey, discussed the crisis in the eastern Mediterranean with Erdoğan during a telephone conversation in late September. The two leaders reportedly sought ways for a peaceful solution to the dispute.
Rondos said the two countries should continue to work to expand cooperation, but he admitted that it would not be an easy task to resolve the deep-seated disputes between the two countries. “There will be misunderstandings, there will be differences. The more we find ways to cooperate, the more we will find constructive and imaginative ways to deal with the issues which separate us,” Rondos said.
‘Papandreou’s visit may not take place’
Papandreou and Erdoğan also discussed a planned high-profile meeting of Turkish and Greek ministers, led by the two prime ministers as part of the High Level Cooperation Council meeting scheduled to take place in Turkey in late October or early November. But Harry Tzimitras, a Greek professor of international law at İstanbul Bilgi University, said the visit might not take place due to opposition among some circles in Greece.
“I hear that some in Greece are urging the prime minister not to visit Turkey at this particular juncture,” Tzimitras told Sunday’s Zaman. According to Tzimitras, most of the members of Papandreou’s government support the rapprochement policy. He said Turkish Prime Minister Erdoğan’s visit to Greece last May was a positive step, but it was portrayed negatively in the Greek media.
The east Mediterranean conflict and its impact
According to Tzimitras, the recent crisis in the east Mediterranean is a political, not just a legal, dispute. According to him, no international legal crisis is without political elements. “I don’t think the legal argument was the primary concern for policy makers in Turkey. Turkey’s position has to be explained from a political standpoint and also in view of the new balance of power in the region,” he said, addressing the new geopolitical framework at play in the region.
Tzimitras believes the logic behind the crisis is political and has its basis in two things. “One is the new political and strategic balancing in progress in the area. And secondly, there is the fact that the Turkish government feels much more secure in terms of its domestic politics, as well as in international politics and its regional stance,” he said. Tension with Israel is also at play in the crisis, Tzimitras said, noting that the assertive attempt of Greek Cyprus to begin drilling has resulted in a perception that Turkey feels left out of the natural gas resource game.
Greece’s economic crisis and bilateral relations
Tzimitras said the economic crisis in Greece could have positive consequences for Greece’s relationship with Turkey. He said that Greece no longer looks at Turkey as an enemy state, which makes making cuts to the Greek defense budget easier. The defense budget is a huge a strain on the Greek economy, at 3 percent of the annual budget. This could be the first of a number of serious of cuts to be carried out. Tzimitras noted that such a cut would indirectly be a positive step toward ending the traditional Turkish-Greek dispute and added that the economic crisis in Greece can be seen not only as a challenge, but also as an opportunity for the two countries to readjust their position toward each other and revisit their priorities in the area.
Rondos underlined that the political psychology in Greece must be taken into account when discussing possible cuts on military expenditures as a result of the recent financial crisis. Rondos said that Turkish military pressure still exists and that Greece is concerned about this in the same way Denmark is concerned about Germany, or Finland about Russia, acknowledging the dilemma of a small countries bordering a large country, and pointed out: “We must remove the reasons for fear on the part of both countries. Turkey must examine very closely whether it can eliminate all the political reasons for maintaining the military option with regard to Greece. Because if Turkey can do that, Greece may feel a little more comfortable negotiating certain things.” In response to a question about the crisis between Turkey and Israel, he made clear that Greece will not choose one side against the other and will keep the channels as open with both sides.
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