In a speech regarding the issue of maritime jurisdiction in the Eastern Mediterranean, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said that Turkey did not accept the ‘Greek Cypriot side’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) delimitation agreements with Egypt, Lebanon, and Israel, which violated the rights of Turkey’ and the Turkish controlled north of Cyprus.
According to a press release sent to the Famagusta Gazette by the Turkish Cypriot PIO (Press and Information Office), the Turkish minister made the remarks in a speech during a panel titled “Turkish Foreign Policy in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean” organized by the Politics, Economics, and Society Researches Foundation (SETA).
Remarking that Greece and the ‘Greek Cypriot side’ have ‘attempted to enter the Turkish continental shelf 9 times since 2021,’ Cavusoglu said that Turkey had not allowed any vessels to enter Turkey’s EEZ.
His comments – which are par for the course in regional politics – come as talks between Cyprus and Lebanon to demarcate maritime borders resumed earlier this week.
Lebanon and Cyprus agreed on a proposed maritime border in 2007, but Lebanon never ratified the agreement. Following the meeting with the Cypriot delegation last Friday, Lebanon’s Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab declared that Lebanon has to reach an agreement with Syria on northern border demarcation to proceed with maritime demarcation with Cyprus as there is a common border point between the three countries.
