Greek Immigration Minister Nótisz Mitarakis and Nikos Panajótopoulos, the head of the Greek Ministry of Defense, will travel to Turkey next week, who said on Sunday that relations between the two countries have eased.
You can feel the tension drop
– said Panajótopoulos in an interview with the Greek television channel Mega, emphasizing that in February and March, no Turkish warplanes were spotted over the islands of the Aegean Sea belonging to Greece.
For decades, the relationship between Athens and Ankara has been overshadowed by migration, their maritime borders, mutual airspace violations, and the possibility of exploiting the huge natural gas resource discovered in the eastern Mediterranean basin in recent years. Last year, Turkish military planes flew over Greek territory 234 times. The Greek Ministry of Defense considers airspace violations to be in violation of Greek sovereignty.
Mitarakis said he would visit the earthquake-hit Hatay province in the company of Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu, and Panajótopoulos had previously informed that he is scheduled to meet with Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar on the same day.
Also on Sunday, the Greek daily Katimerini wrote, “Ankara strikes a completely different tone” regarding Greece.
According to analysts, following the February 6 earthquake that devastated parts of Turkey and Syria, resulting in more than 50,000 deaths, and the subsequent international aid
the two NATO member states are trying to reduce the tension between them.
Cover photo credit: Maciej Luczniewski/NurPhoto via Getty Images
