Egypt has told Greece it does not want to continue maritime boundary talks without Türkiye, according to a Greek ruling-party lawmaker whose remarks on television have drawn attention in Greek and Turkish media.
Dimitris Keridis, a member of parliament for Greece’s governing New Democracy party, said on the ANT1 channel that Athens had invited Cairo to continue delimitation talks, and that Egypt replied: "No, Türkiye must also come," Birlik Gazetesi, Türkiye newspaper and Haber 7 reported. Keridis said this was because Türkiye has its own claims in the area, according to the reports. Birlik Gazetesi and Türkiye said he was speaking on the morning programme "Kalimera Ellada" in a debate with an emeritus professor of geopolitics.
There has been no official statement from the Egyptian government on the issue, and the Egyptian position rests on Keridis’s account.
The unfinished 2020 deal
Greece and Egypt signed a partial agreement delimiting their exclusive economic zones in August 2020. The deal left out a large area stretching from east of Rhodes towards Cyprus, an area that remains disputed largely because of the small Greek island of Meis (Kastellorizo) off Türkiye’s southern coast, Haber 7 and Birlik Gazetesi reported. Greece, Türkiye, Egypt and the Greek Cypriot administration have overlapping claims there, Keridis said, according to the reports.
Talks revived after Libya vote
According to Birlik Gazetesi and Haber 7, Athens and Cairo agreed to restart technical talks on extending the 2020 deal eastward after Libya’s parliament approved the 2019 Türkiye–Libya maritime memorandum in October. That vote, which Greece opposes, was covered in our report on Libya’s parliament approving the maritime deal.
Sources
- Keridis’ten Mısır itirafı: Mısır, Türkiye’nin de masada olmasını istiyor (Birlik Gazetesi)
- Doğu Akdeniz’de Türkiye’yi dışlayan masaya Kahire’den itiraz! (Türkiye Gazetesi)
- Yunan vekilden dikkat çeken açıklama: Mısır, Türkiye’yi masaya çağırıyor (İşçi Haber / Haber 7)
Photo: Yair Haklai / CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
