Do not play with fire, said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoλουlu, addressing the Republic of Cyprus because, as he said, he allowed the opening of offices to the Syrian Kurds (PYD) who in Turkey are linked to the PKK. If the PKK attacks Turkey or the Turkish Cypriots tomorrow, the Greek Cypriots will pay a heavy price, he threatened. Regarding EastMed, the Turkish Minister said that it was a political effort and that a lesson should be learned from it, adding that the findings of the new Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulidis from the beginning were “very important”.
In a joint press conference with his Estonian counterpart, Tsavousoglu said that “Turkey is in favor of a fair distribution in the eastern Mediterranean and in this context an investigation is underway.” He claimed that “in the last year there have been nine attempts by Greece and the Greek Cypriots to violate our continental shelf”, adding that the last attempt was made this morning. They did not succeed in any of them. “
He went on to say that “this shows that these countries, which are not in favor of a fair distribution, have taken steps to exclude Turkey. They created different platforms. EastMed was one of them. “We said from the beginning that the EastMed project is not a financial project and it is not possible to carry it out,” said the Turkish Foreign Minister.
Mr. Tsavousoglou stated that it was a political effort and argued that “a lesson should be learned from this”, while he stated that “the findings from the beginning were very important” made by the “new Greek Foreign Minister”.
“Based on this project, the Greek Cypriot side did not agree on a fair distribution of hydrocarbons, despite the three proposals of the Turkish Cypriots. As Greece did not approach either. Now the most economical way for gas to reach Europe is through Turkey. It must pass through Turkey. Turkey never said no to cooperation, even when there was tension, that was the purpose of our President in his proposal to the EU for a conference on the eastern Mediterranean. Then everyone would win and no one would lose. But especially the EU, I do not know how, but it must specifically convince these two countries, Greece and the Greek Cypriot sector. “Otherwise it is not possible to refer to a solution,” he added.
“I want to say the same to my Estonian counterpart. If in Cyprus we solve the issue of fair sharing only, we will have solved 51% of the problems of the eastern Mediterranean. The solution is so simple but also so difficult. “In the final analysis, we knew that this project would not be implemented,” said the Turkish Foreign Minister.
The second issue, he added, concerns “the opening of an office of the terrorist organization PYD-YPG (Syrian Kurds) in southern Cyprus.”
“Supporting terrorism is a serious matter. There have been countries that have used terrorist organizations to date. We, as Turkey, have always been in solidarity even with the countries with which we have the worst relations regarding terrorism. We did not support any terrorist organization. Unfortunately, there are still members of the PKK and DHKP-C in Greece. It has been proven that they were trained there and later attacked Turkey. “I am not even referring to the FETOs (Gulenists) who took refuge there,” he said.
Mevlüt Çavuşoλουlu said that “opening offices and hosting terrorist organizations is like playing with fire. After all, we know the support of the Greek Cypriot sector to the terrorist organization, the PKK. “This is not a secret.”
Finally, he made threats, saying “but I want to say this: They allow them to open offices there, if there is a threat tomorrow, if there is an attack on Turkey or on our brothers in the TRNC we will make them pay a heavy price. Let them not play with fire. Do not cooperate with terrorist organizations. “There may be issues on which we disagree, but the issue of terrorism is different, it is a matter of security and I have to say it clearly.”
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