Greece wants Libya to talk about EEZ
Athens, worried about unilateral moves, sends message to Tripoli via US Secretary Blinken
Kathimerini understands that Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis urged US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in a phone call last Monday, to put pressure on the Tripoli government to come to the table and discuss the demarcation of the two countries’ maritime jurisdictions, including their respective exclusive economic zones.
While noting that he also favors open communication channels with Turkey, Mitsotakis was firm in insisting that Greece would regard any actions, such as hydrocarbon exploration, stemming from the recently signed Turkish-Libyan memorandum, as illegal and that it would react accordingly.
Turkey and Libya are not bordering countries in the Mediterranean – Egypt and Greece get in the way – unless one accepts Turkey’s claim that islands do not have their own continental shelf nor can they claim an EEZ around them. In this case, this concerns Crete, in particular, the largest island in the area.
Mitsotakis insisted to Blinken that Greece and Libya must resume the bilateral dialogue on maritime zone delimitation that was halted in 2010, a year before the bloody downfall of longtime strongman Muammar Gaddafi.
Mitsotakis said he told Blinken that Libya must be reminded it has to talk to Greece as a neighboring country and that, for the European Union as well, the Turkish-Libyan memorandum has no legal basis. He also told the US secretary of state that communication with Libya would help regional stability and security whereas an illegal memorandum does not.
Mitsotakis and Blinken also touched upon Turkey’s aggressive rhetoric, with Mitsotakis saying that he is still in favor of open communication despite Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s negativity.
Still, Greek officials believe that, after the bilateral meeting of the two defense ministers, Turkey’s Hulusi Akar and Greece’s Nikos Panagiotopoulos, on the sideline of a NATO meeting, such communication, which could help de-escalate a crisis, already exists. They also feel Washington could provide a useful check to any attempt by Erdogan to provoke a crisis ahead of a difficult, for him, presidential election in mid-2023.
Despite his public rhetoric, Erdogan, who wants the sale of F-16 fighter planes and upgrade kits to go through, is keenly aware of the need of a good working relationship with the US.
