Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias will visit Turkey on April 14, Turkey's top diplomat Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said Wednesday, APA reports citing dailysabah.com.
The statement came after Dendias on Tuesday expressed willingness to meet his Turkish counterpart Çavuşoğlu, but said "it must be carried out in the right climate."
Speaking at a news conference after meeting his Palestinian counterpart Riyad al-Maliki in the Greek capital Athens, Dendias briefly touched upon the new round of consultative talks between Turkey and Greece.
Dendias said he hopes that talks will lead to finding a common ground to resolve "the sole bilateral dispute" between the two countries.
"In other words, the delimitation of the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and continental shelf in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean, in accordance with international law and the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea," he said.
Dendias noted that political consultations between the Turkish and Greek Foreign Ministries are scheduled to take place in Athens on Wednesday.
"At this point, I would like to add – and I have said this in the past that, I am willing to meet with my Turkish counterpart and friend Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, but for such a meeting to have a point, of course, it must be carried out in the right climate," he added.
On the Turkish side, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan late Tuesday ruled out making any concessions to Greece concerning its rights in the Eastern Mediterranean.
“Turkey’s determination continues unchanged,” he told journalists during a news conference. “In other words, there can be no question of us making any concessions.”
Senior diplomats from NATO members Greece and Turkey failed to reach a breakthrough on Tuesday during the latest round of talks on their standoff over Eastern Mediterranean borders and energy rights.
Although Dendias told reporters afterward that his country was "participating in these talks in good faith," the two sides seemed far apart both on the scope and details of the talks.
Tuesday's talks were the second meeting this year after the two sides met in Istanbul in January, ending a nearly five-year pause in the dialogue – and taking place only after European Union pressure.
The latest talks did not start on the best note after a diplomatic note from Ankara a day earlier drew a line in the sand.
The note was addressed to Israel, Greece and the EU, telling them to seek Ankara's permission before proceeding with work on a proposed undersea power cable in disputed Eastern Mediterranean waters.
Both sides cite a range of decades-old treaties and international agreements to support their conflicting territorial claims.
Follow us on Telegram
t.me/apanewsaz
Follow us on Instagram
Follow us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
