Daily Sabah
December 25, 2022

Türkiye urges NATO to ‘stop’ Greece’s ‘impertinence’

Amid Türkiye’s “well-intentioned approaches” to make the Aegean and Mediterranean a “sea of friendship,” Defense Minister Hulusi Akar on Saturday called on NATO to urge Greece to “stop” its “impertinence.”

“….Greece continues to provoke and escalate tensions and its unlawful attitude,” Akar said at the Defense Ministry’s year-end evaluation meeting.

Asserting that Greece has harassed Turkish jets taking part in NATO exercises twice in the last week, Akar said: “This hostile attitude clearly shows that Greece has become so arrogant that it disregards the basic principles and values of NATO. It’s time for NATO to say ‘stop’ to this impertinence.”

***

Underlining that Greece should take a lesson from history, Akar also pointed to the events of Sept. 9, 1922, in Izmir, a city on Türkiye’s western coast that was liberated from Greek occupation in the Turkish War of Independence.

***

Türkiye, a vital NATO member for over 70 years, has complained….

Nordic NATO bids

On Sweden and Finland’s NATO accession bids, Akar reiterated Türkiye’s expectation from the two Nordic countries “to fulfill the commitments they signed in Madrid, in which is to cut their support to terrorists and to remove the restrictions they have imposed against Türkiye on the extradition list.“

“It’s that simple,” he said.

“We support NATO’s open-door policy. We are not against Sweden and Finland’s NATO membership,” he added.

“They say, ‘there’s a war between Ukraine and Russia, we expect NATO to be strong.’ Türkiye is one of the most important members of NATO,” he reiterated.

Meeting Türkiye’s security needs “actually and logically means Türkiye being strong….Don’t forget a strong Türkiye is a strong NATO.”