“Levitha, Syrna and Agathonisi are under Greek occupation,” defiantly declared the vice-president of the Turkish extra-parliamentary party Yeniden Refah Partisi (New Welfare Party), Doğan Aydal going so far as to claim that islands and islets around Crete are… Turkish.
Speaking to Sözcü TV about the possibility of extending the territorial waters to 12 nautical miles from Greece, Aydal said that our country, taking advantage of the Law of the Sea, is trying to “narrow Turkey’s Exclusive Economic Zone and recalled the casus belli made on Greece.
“They also invaded two islands. In Levitha and Syrna. They were transporting troops there as in Agathonisi. We are not talking about small islands here. It is three times the size of the Princes. If they extend their territorial waters to these islands in Levitha and Syrna, our exit to the Aegean will become more difficult. That is why we, in 1995, through the Parliament, made the casus belli. In other words, expanding territorial waters here is a cause of war for us.”
The vice president of the party went so far as to defiantly claim that islands and islets around Crete belong to Turkey and that there can be an agreement with Greece after… consultation.
“Those islands are ours. Six of them are around the area of Crete. Close to Crete. With maritime law, they are trying to narrow Turkey’s Exclusive Economic Zone. There can be an agreement on this through consultation,” he said.
According to the Turkish narrative, the islands around Crete that the neighbours are methodically trying to “grey” are Avgonisi, Dias, two rocky islands near Dias, Petalidi, Paximadi, Dionysades, a rocky island north of Dionysades, Dragonada, Prasonisi and Paximada.
The New Prosperity party may be extra-parliamentary, but in the recent presidential election in Turkey, it strongly supported the re-election of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
https://greekcitytimes.com/2023/09/12/dogan-aydal-crete-turkish-erdogan/