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While waiting for the 62nd round of exploratory talks between #Greece- #Turkey, Ankara issued a new #navtex between 18 Feb. and 02 March for maritime surveys (see below). This time between islands of #Lemnos & #Skyros, in the middle of the #Aegean. ( #map in next tweet)
While waiting for the 62nd round of exploratory talks between #Greece- #Turkey, Ankara issued a new #navtex between 18 Feb. and 02 March for maritime surveys (see below). This time between islands of #Lemnos & #Skyros, in the middle of the #Aegean. ( #map in next tweet)
#Lemnos is among the islands in eastern #Aegean which #Turkey demands to be demilitarized. Also important is that the new #navtex is located exactly at the point where Turkey claims the #Aegean should be split - i.e. along the 25th meridian (see #map in next tweet). >
Thus the location is not accidental. Of course this is not the first time that #Turkey operates around this area. If I recall correctly they conducted #military #drills in close by locations during 2018. #navtex >
But today these moves should be contextualized in the broader TR strategy that we've seen unfolding particularly since 2019 and includes the #Cyprus #EEZ, the #Turkey- #Libya MoU (& broader involvement in that country), the surveys south of #Kastellorizo, the new drillship, etc.
We unpacked this strategy to a certain extent with @JMJalel_H for @ForeignPolicy here: https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/01/19/turkey-greece-what-erdogan-wants-eastern-mediterranean-sovereignty-natural-gas/
It occurs that #Turkey and #Erdogan had no intention for these exploratory talks to succeed. Regional strategy aside, faced with a number of domestic pressures Erdogan cannot easily proceed to a mutually beneficial agreement with #Greece because that would make him look weak.
The geopolitical strategy remains. But at a juncture where he is looking for electoral allies, in view of potential snap elections this or next year, and seems to be stuck with the nationalists of #MHP, a more moderate approach to #Greece- #Turkey issues seems rather unlikely.
The reproduction of the crisis seems more likely, as that would appease certain political parties domestically and garner more nationalist votes. At least for the time being, the #Biden- #Blinken factor doesn't seem to work very well. Not to mention the #EU. #Turkey #US #navtex
Fun historical fact: Between Oct 26-30 1918, following its #WWI defeat, then Ottoman government accepted & signed an armistice. It was "negotiated" & signed aboard #Agamemnon, a Royal Navy flagship undr the command of British Admiral Calthorpe, anchored in #Lemnos' #Mudros harbor
Calthorpe was empowered by the Allies to negotiate the Armistice of #Mudros that was very much humiliating for the Ottoman Empire and opened the way for the also devastating Treaty of Sevres (1920). The rival to Ottoman gov. resistance movement was not happy w Mudros or Sevres.>
So, whereas, according to historian Erik Zurcher, "Turkish historiography has has conditioned us to juxtapose the defeat of 1918 and the armistice that ensued with the triumph of 1922", for #Erdogan this could not really be considered a triumph or sufficient >>
because of the concessions Kemal's resistance movement made between 1919 and 1923 (Lausanne Treaty). It is by now clear that #Erdogan is not only unhappy with #Mudros and #Sevres but also with #Lausanne. Hence the talk about the #NationalPact, revising Lausanne, #MaviVatan, etc.
