European Union Has No Right To Define Borders In Mediterranean - Turkish Minister

European Union Has No Right to Define Borders in Mediterranean - Turkish Minister

BRUSSELS (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 19th June, 2019) The European Union does not have any authority to define the boundaries in the Mediterranean Sea, Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Faruk Kaymakci said on Tuesday, reacting to the bloc's recent threats of sanctions over Turkish drilling in the disputed waters near Cyprus.

Earlier in the day, the Council of the European Union called upon Turkey to respect the rights of Cyprus in connection with Ankara's drilling for energy reserves off the island's coast and instructed the European Commission and other bodies to immediately submit response options.

"We should cooperate [in the Mediterranean], but we cannot try to define the borders of states via maritime projects. The borders of countries can only be determined by the countries in question but not the European Union. The European Union has no jurisdiction to define the borders either in the Black Sea or in the Mediterranean Sea," Kaymakci said at the first joint conference between the Black Sea Economic Cooperation and the European Union in Brussels.

According to the official, Turkey hopes that energy will become a sphere of cooperation, but not "tension or conflict.

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Due to overlapping claims of jurisdiction over areas around Cyprus, the exploration of hydrocarbon resources off the coast of the island has been a hot issue ever since the first gas deposits were discovered there in 2011. Last week, Turkey said that it would not back down from gas exploration in Cyprus. The Greek Cypriots say that Turkey is violating Cyprus's exclusive commercial area.

The island nation of Cyprus has been de facto divided into the Republic of Cyprus and the non-recognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus for decades. The crisis started back in 1974, when Turkey sent its troops to the island in response to an attempted coup by the Greek military. As a result, Ankara occupied nearly 40 percent of the country's territory, where the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus was proclaimed in 1983. Turkey remains the only country in the world that recognizes this republic.

In May this year, a Turkish drill ship Fatih anchored west of Cyprus, prompting the latter to issue warrants for the Turkish crew. A second Turkish vessel is expected to set off for an area to the east of Cyprus.