Greek Foreign Minister George Gerapetritis has pushed back against claims that Athens has taken a timid line toward Turkey, insisting that engagement with Ankara is a means to national ends, not a sign of weakness.
In an interview with To Vima, Gerapetritis said “the Greece of passive diplomatic inertia is gone for good.” The so-called “calm waters” approach, he argued, is not an end in itself. Recent de-escalation, he said, has given Greece room to contain crises, grow the economy, modernize the armed forces and widen its diplomatic network.
He pointed to new Rafale fighters, upgraded F-16s, Belharra frigates and forthcoming F-35s as proof that Greece now holds a stronger air and naval position. That military edge, he added, sits alongside closer strategic ties with the United States, France, Israel, Egypt, India and Gulf states.
On the 2023 Athens Declaration, Gerapetritis said the framework remains a useful channel of communication. It does not, he stressed, imply any retreat from Greek legal positions; both sides keep their claims intact.
He was blunt about Turkey’s newly declared Aegean marine parks. They are “illegal” and have no legal effect, he said, because they extend into undelimited waters over Greece’s continental shelf. “Any attempt to violate our sovereign rights will be met with every available means.” Greece remains committed to peaceful settlement, he added, but is “absolutely ready for any scenario.”
Greece also retains the “inalienable right” to extend its territorial waters to 12 nautical miles and can do so unilaterally “at a time and in a manner of Greece’s choosing.”
Gerapetritis dismissed the idea that Athens is “overinvesting” in Israel. Greek policy, he said, is multi-layered, with open channels to both Israel and the Arab world. He also reaffirmed that the Greece–Cyprus electricity interconnector is essential to ending Cyprus’s energy isolation and will be fully implemented.
READ MORE: Turkish Analysts Debate Scenario of Israeli Attack on Istanbul.
