Greek boats violated Turkish territorial waters, prompting the Coast Guard to respond
Last night, three boats belonging to the Greek Coast Guard crossed the Kardak islets and entered Turkish waters. The Greek Coast Guard teams, which ignored the warnings of Turkish troops, entered the Turkish territorial waters for about 15 minutes and violated the border.
Turkish Coast Guard teams intervened in the Greek Coast Guard, which did not leave Turkish territorial waters. After about half an hour, the Turkish Coast Guard crews slammed into the Greek Coast Guard boats and pushed them out of Turkish waters.
Following the incident, two attack boats, six Coast Guard boats, one war ship and one search and rescue ship were sent by Turkey to the Kardak islets. Turkish troops did not leave the region throughout the night.
Three boats and one war ship belonging to the Greek Coast Guard teams that saw Turkish soldiers on the Kardak islets did not approach the region. Greek soldiers in their own territorial waters did not leave the area, while Turkish attack boats waiting near Çavuş Island and around Çatal Island remained in the region.
The Kardak islets, called Imia in Greek, are located seven kilometers from the Turkish port of Bodrum.
“Turkey is not helping to smooth out the turbulence, it's doing the opposite,” said Greek government spokesman Dimitris Tzanakopoulos following the incident.
Tzanakopoulos said Athens was "troubled" by Turkey's actions.
A decades-long dispute between Turkey and Greece over the uninhabited Aegean islets brought the two countries to the brink of armed conflict in 1996 and led to renewed tensions this year.
Ankara has "explicitly" told Greece that refraining from tensions would be "better" for bilateral ties, Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said on Wednesday.
Talking to the media at Ankara’s Esenboga Airport before leaving for Belarus, Yıldırım said: "We explicitly expressed to him [Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras] that refraining from tensions will be better, with regards to relations between the two countries."
His remarks came a day after he and Tsipras spoke over the phone and discussed recent developments in the Aegean Sea.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday warned Cyprus not to "overstep the mark" in the eastern Mediterranean, after Greek Cypriots accused the Turkish military of obstructing a vessel exploring for natural gas over the weekend.
"We warn those who overstep the mark in Cyprus and the Aegean. They should not think that their search for natural gas off Cyprus and the islets in the Aegean is going unnoticed,” said Erdoğan.
“Greek boats have entered the Kardak islets. From the beginning, we told the Greek side ‘Don’t do such things and also don’t get us in trouble. Let’s stop these skirmishes in both the air and the water. When they didn’t stop, our soldiers did their duty,” he added.
Turkey, which does not have diplomatic relations with Cyprus, says that some areas of Cyprus's offshore maritime zone fall under the jurisdiction of Turkey or Turkish Cypriots.
