Athens, 7 December 2023(TDI): Today, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met the Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, in Greece for the 5th meeting of the Turkiye-Greece High-Level Cooperation Council.
Turkish President Erdogan met with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis during a one-day visit to evaluate bilateral ties and explore ways to enhance collaboration.
Additionally, Turkiye and Greece have had an unstable relationship throughout the years. Despite considerable progress in 2021, several issues between the two neighboring countries remain unresolved.
In the last seven years, Greece and Turkiye have experienced significant challenges, including a pandemic, a European war, energy, inflation, and food crises, as well as climate change and natural disasters, which have tested their endurance beyond national borders.
Greece and Turkiye have generated concerns, but the two countries have navigated through fluctuations in their bilateral relations, occasionally confronting dangerous challenges that may threaten security and stability in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Furthermore, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis emphasized peaceful living and constructive dispute resolution, announcing that Greece and Turkiye’s presidents agreed to initiate diplomatic contacts in Vilnius in July to enhance cooperation.
Meanwhile, the process was handed over to the individual foreign ministers, indicating a coordinated push toward cooperative discussion.
Both leaders signed the Declaration of Friendly and Good Neighborly Relations, which outlines principles for conversation and cooperation as well as a roadmap for expanding the positive agenda, deepening economic cooperation, and pursuing confidence-building measures (CBMS).
Progress in Key Sectors: Trade, Technology, and Tourism
However, both countries made significant progress through improved agreements in power, trade, education, sports, technology, and tourism.
Bilateral trade reached 5 billion euros, with a five-year target of 10 billion euros. Efforts were made to enhance agriculture sector collaboration, research, innovation, and young scientist collaboration.
In addition, both leaders expressed openness to participating in subsequent meetings on controversial matters such as the delimitation of the continental shelf and the Exclusive Economic Zone.
Both Greece and Turkey discussed immigration, border control, and collaboration, with Greece promoting Türkiye’s European entry and visa facilitation, emphasizing international law’s importance, and opposing violence, extremism, and terrorism.
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During the meeting, disagreements on the Cyprus problem were acknowledged, and the importance of resuming discussion was emphasized.
In a post-inauguration statement, Prime Minister Mitsotakis praised Thrace’s peaceful coexistence of Christians and Muslims, highlighting equal chances and the Greek government’s ongoing efforts to strengthen this bond.
In the end, Prime Minister Mitsotakis highlighted the importance of building a tomorrow of peace, growth, and cooperation while appreciating the historical debt owed to bring the two states together.
He stated his intention to visit Ankara in the spring and invited President Erdogan to the NATO Summit in Washington in July.
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