Deputy Prime Ministry and Ministry of Foreign Affairs: “The Greek Cypriot leadership is gravely mistaken”
13 May, 2020Spokesperson of the Turkish Foreign Ministry Hami Aksoy responded to a question regarding the joint declaration adopted by the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Egypt, Greece, Greek Cypriot Administration, France and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Aksoy recorded the following :
‘The joint declaration of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Egypt, Greece, GCA, France and the UAE in respect of the Eastern Mediterranean and Libya, is a case in point of the hypocrisy of a group of countries who are seeking regional chaos and instability through the policies they pursue and seeing no harm in sacrificing the democratic aspirations of the peoples to the callous aggression of putschist dictators, and which have fallen into confusion, as their agendas are being disrupted by Turkey.
The fact that Greece and GCA, instead of engaging in dialogue with Turkey and TRNC respectively on the Eastern Mediterranean, are relying on irrelevant non-regional actors, can only be the legacy of a mentality of mandate and colonialism. The distortion of the steps taken by Turkey in order to protect its legitimate interests based on international law, through unfair and unlawful pretexts, is unacceptable under any circumstances.
The same applies equally for Egypt. The rulers of this country seem to have long preferred to renounce the interests and rights of its own people, rather than protecting them.
As for the UAE, which has no connection whatsoever to the Eastern Mediterranean, it is none other than the animosity towards Turkey that unites it with the other countries. The track record of this country both against Turkey and Libya is self-evident.
It is apparent that France, whose intentions to establish a state of terror in Syria were disrupted with a heavy blow by our Operation Peace Spring, is attempting to be the patron of this axis of malice, in such a state of mind.
We call on all these countries to act with common sense, in accordance with international law and practices.
Peace and stability in our region can only be achieved through genuine and realistic dialogue and cooperation rather than attempting to create axis of malice.’