Jigs
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Tuesday, October 19, 2010
ISTANBUL Daily News with wires
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said Monday he will not participate in a climate change summit in Greece on Friday if his Israeli counterpart is there.
But regardless of whether he attends the summit, the Turkish prime minister will still travel to Greece on Friday for his second meeting with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou in six months, the Turkish Prime Ministry confirmed Tuesday.
Erdoğan is scheduled to represent Turkey at the Mediterranean Climate Change Initiative on Friday, as both he and Papandreou are listed among the keynote speakers of the event.
But Erdoğan told Greece's Skai TV on Monday that he did not want to talk to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and would not attend the summit if Netanyahu is there. The Israeli prime minister is not on the list of speakers, and Israel is not among the list of confirmed participants, the Daily News has learned.
Relations between Turkey and Israel, once close allies, plummeted after Israeli commandos raided a Gaza-bound aid ship on May 31, killing eight Turks and one American of Turkish descent.
"A prime minister who is proud of such an armed intervention is a prime minister with whom I do not agree to talk," Erdoğan told Skai TV, according to Reuters news agency.
Israel says its commandos resorted to force only after they were attacked when they rappelled onto the deck of the ferry, but pro-Palestinian activists on board say the soldiers opened fire as soon as they landed. Turkey has demanded that Israel apologize and pay compensation as pre-conditions for normalizing ties.
"On this issue, I think that Israel is close to the point of losing a very important friend in the Middle East and that is Turkey," Reuters cited Erdoğan as saying. "I think that they must pay for this audacity that characterizes the policy of this government."
Friday's summit in Athens will be a platform for discussions on environmental dangers and climate change in the Mediterranean region.
Turkey-Greek ties
Erdoğan and Papandreou were expected to discuss bilateral Greek-Turkish matters on the sidelines of the Athens summit, sources said last week.
The two leaders also met earlier this year when Erdoğan traveled to Athens in May for a landmark visit during which the two countries signed 21 agreements.
As foreign minister in 1999, Papandreou and his late Turkish counterpart İsmail Cem led a rapprochement drive, drawing on unprecedented solidarity the two nations displayed after deadly quakes hit them a few weeks apart.
Turkey and Greece have been fighting wars since the days of the Byzantine Empire and nearly came to blows as recently as 1996 over an uninhabited string of islets in the Aegean Sea.
ISTANBUL Daily News with wires
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said Monday he will not participate in a climate change summit in Greece on Friday if his Israeli counterpart is there.
But regardless of whether he attends the summit, the Turkish prime minister will still travel to Greece on Friday for his second meeting with Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou in six months, the Turkish Prime Ministry confirmed Tuesday.
Erdoğan is scheduled to represent Turkey at the Mediterranean Climate Change Initiative on Friday, as both he and Papandreou are listed among the keynote speakers of the event.
But Erdoğan told Greece's Skai TV on Monday that he did not want to talk to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and would not attend the summit if Netanyahu is there. The Israeli prime minister is not on the list of speakers, and Israel is not among the list of confirmed participants, the Daily News has learned.
Relations between Turkey and Israel, once close allies, plummeted after Israeli commandos raided a Gaza-bound aid ship on May 31, killing eight Turks and one American of Turkish descent.
"A prime minister who is proud of such an armed intervention is a prime minister with whom I do not agree to talk," Erdoğan told Skai TV, according to Reuters news agency.
Israel says its commandos resorted to force only after they were attacked when they rappelled onto the deck of the ferry, but pro-Palestinian activists on board say the soldiers opened fire as soon as they landed. Turkey has demanded that Israel apologize and pay compensation as pre-conditions for normalizing ties.
"On this issue, I think that Israel is close to the point of losing a very important friend in the Middle East and that is Turkey," Reuters cited Erdoğan as saying. "I think that they must pay for this audacity that characterizes the policy of this government."
Friday's summit in Athens will be a platform for discussions on environmental dangers and climate change in the Mediterranean region.
Turkey-Greek ties
Erdoğan and Papandreou were expected to discuss bilateral Greek-Turkish matters on the sidelines of the Athens summit, sources said last week.
The two leaders also met earlier this year when Erdoğan traveled to Athens in May for a landmark visit during which the two countries signed 21 agreements.
As foreign minister in 1999, Papandreou and his late Turkish counterpart İsmail Cem led a rapprochement drive, drawing on unprecedented solidarity the two nations displayed after deadly quakes hit them a few weeks apart.
Turkey and Greece have been fighting wars since the days of the Byzantine Empire and nearly came to blows as recently as 1996 over an uninhabited string of islets in the Aegean Sea.
