Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis will visit Ankara on Monday where he will meet with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan accepting the Turkish president’s invitation and in exchange of Erdogan’s visit to Greece in December 2023. The meeting aims at keeping the communication channels open at the highest level as well, so that Greek-Turkish relations can progress to the next step, but also for the two leaders to review the progress at the level of bilateral relations in the areas of cooperation that have been agreed, government sources said.
As the same sources said, it is the first visit Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ visit to Ankara- in March 2022 he was in Istanbul and had lunch with the President of Turkey – but also the first visit of a Greek prime minister to the Turkish capital in the last five years.
Government sources reminded that during the meeting of the Greece-Turkey Supreme Cooperation Council last December in Athens, the two leaders adopted the Declaration of Athens, while 15 Memorandums of Cooperation were signed between the two sides. The same persons predict that during the meeting all the issues of the bilateral agenda are expected to be discussed, while the schedule of the next contacts at the level of political dialogue, positive agenda and Confidence Building Measures (CBM) is also expected to be defined.
Additionally, the next meeting of the two leaders at UN General Assembly in New York next September is still expected to be confirmed while the two leaders will also be present at the NATO Summit next July in Washington. Government sources confirm, moreover, that the prime minister will also raise the issue of the conversion of the Monastery of Chora into a mosque during his meeting with Ergodan.
The same persons also pointed out that the new round of meetings has already taken place based on the three axes agreed by the two leaders last July in Vilnius (political dialogue, Confidence Building Measures, positive agenda) and which were agreed upon by Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Recep Tayip Erdogan in their last meeting. It should be noted that this is the fourth meeting that the Prime Minister will have with the President of Turkey after the re-election of both (the first was held in July 2023 on the sidelines of the NATO Summit in Vilnius, the second in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly and the third in Athens last December).
Government sources underline that the re-activation of contacts and communication channels between Greece and Turkey in recent months has already had measurable results and point to the implementation of visa facilitation for Turkish citizens in 10 islands of the Eastern Aegean, to the almost zero criminality in the air, but also in the better cooperation with the Turkish authorities in migration and in the overall reduction of flows, despite the ups and downs. Government sources stress, however, that “disagreements apparently remain. The important thing is that they do not lead to crises. The fact that we disagree does not mean that we do not discuss and steps are not taken to shape a better climate and invest in the positive agenda.”
Finally, the same sources clarify about the marine parks that “the position of the Greek government was clear from the first moment. Greece, respecting International Law and especially the Law of the Sea and with a firm basis in its sovereignty and sovereign rights, will proceed with the creation of marine parks on the basis of environmental criteria, in accordance with its planning.”
