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The Ministry of National Defense is focusing on resuming the dialogue with Turkey on Confidence Building Measures in the Aegean, at the military level, with the information that they want the Greek representative in the Alliance, Rear Admiral Ioannis Pavlopoulos to have relevant information. for Greek intentions.
According to Pentagon circles, any discussion about the measures to be taken to ease tension in the Greek archipelago must take place bilaterally and not at the NATO level, where the first reason will not be to find common ground. solutions, but pressure to have some effect.
“NATO has shown with its position that it does not care who is right and who is not, who has international law on their side and who is not. Its role is arbitrary and it will move accordingly, pressing for concessions the one it considers weaker and less valuable geostrategically, in this case Greece ”, emphasize the same circles.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs considers that Turkey, by putting on the table for debate in NATO a series of technical issues ranging from navigation to sovereignty issues in the Aegean, seeks to close some of the provocative objections that it sometimes raises on the table in your favor. of discussions.
“The Turks seek to impose on our country some of their objections, which refer mainly to the military level, such as not catching their fighter jets, our weapons and our radar, when they fly in the airspace between 6 and 10 miles or to proceed to the demilitarization of the Aegean islands. “All this and much more that the Turks have on their agenda, it is obvious that we cannot discuss it at the Alliance level and in a difficult environment, so suffocating for us”, the same circles continue.
In the Pentagon, relevant meetings have been held on the subject between the political and military leadership, since at least initially there were some objections to the resumption of the debate on the MOE, by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which in recent days seem to have declined. It should be noted that representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs participated in the previous rounds of discussions on the MOE, having the first word in the negotiations between the two parties. In this context, and if Ankara agrees in advance, in the next period and possibly before the end of the year, we will have another round of discussions on MOEs between the military delegations of the two countries. It should be remembered that the military delegations of the two countries had met for the last time in Athens from February 17 to 21.
Speed up the dialogue
For their part, the Turks show that they not only wish with enthusiasm, but also do everything possible to speed up the relevant dialogue, seeking to impose relevant calendars on the Greek side. At the same time, they are doing their best not only to keep the process relevant at the NATO level, but at the same time to expand it further, something that emerged from relevant statements made during the visit of Alliance Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. last Monday in Ankara.
This wish seems to largely coincide with the Alliance’s intentions, and Stoltenberg noted immediately after his meeting with Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoλουlu, that “the underlying differences between the two countries can now only be addressed through of negotiations in the spirit of allied solidarity and international law “. NATO considers that the military deterrence mechanism developed by the Eastern Mediterranean Alliance, through which a 24-hour, 7-week-a-week communication line was established between Greece and Turkey to avoid crises, could be further expanded with the in order to resolve other “technical” issues on which the two parties do not agree.
As part of the Turkish effort to accelerate the start of a new Greek-Turkish dialogue, sources from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Navtex broadcast on the 7th of the month by the Smyrna hydrographic station for live-fire exercises of the Turkish Navy in the heart of the Aegean. the day of our national holiday on October 28. More specifically, according to the Turkish directive, the exercises will begin on October 26 and will be completed two days later, while an important maritime zone between the islands of Skyros, Psara, Evia and Chios is committed to its completion.
