The European Parliament's full plenary session in Strasbourg will take up Turkish provocations in the Aegean and Eastern...

The European Parliament's full plenary session in Strasbourg will take up Turkish provocations in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean next Thursday, as Greece and Cyprus push the EU to treat the tension as a matter of collective European security, not just a bilateral Greek-Turkish dispute. The session was triggered by a formal proposal from Manolis Kefalogiannis, president of the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee, and Loukas Fourlas, head of the Cypriot delegation to the European People's Party. Their joint submission follows coordinated interventions by the New Democracy parliamentary group at EPP meetings and the Conference of Presidents of the European Parliament. The two MEPs singled out Turkey's longstanding threat of war, the so-called casus belli, if Greece extends its territorial waters, calling it "particularly unacceptable" and incompatible with Turkey's relationship to an EU member state. Ankara has never formally withdrawn that threat despite periodic statements favoring dialogue. The proposal also flags Turkey's unilateral maritime zone claims in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean, its challenges to Greek island sovereignty, its moves to declare marine parks in waters it does not control, and its continued interference with Cyprus. Athens has repeatedly rejected these claims as contrary to international law, arguing Turkey is attempting to create facts on the ground. Energy infrastructure is now part of the equation too. Turkish interference around the planned Greece-Cyprus electricity interconnection has been added to the list of grievances heading into Strasbourg, tying energy security directly to the broader sovereignty dispute. The core argument Greece and Cyprus are bringing to the plenary is straightforward: challenges to the sovereignty of EU member states are a European problem, not a bilateral one, and the EU's institutions need to respond accordingly. #Greece #Turkey #EuropeanParliament