The United States President Joe Biden will raise the issue of Turkey’s activities in the eastern Mediterranean during his upcoming meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on Tuesday.
Responding to a question by Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat and chairman of the foreign relations panel, about what the administration was doing to address a series of provocative activities by Turkey under Erdoğan, Blinken said he shared the concerns about Ankara’s behaviour which he described as “deeply disturbing.”
“Our differences with Turkey… are no secret,” Blinken said. “And in many respects, Turkey is not acting as required of an ally, as the supply of S-400s from Russia shows,” he said confirming that differences between Washington and Ankara will be at the centre of talks between the two leaders.
“Turkey violates international law when it threatens Cyprus in its own exclusive economic zone (EEZ), when it declares an EEZ that reaches as far as Libya, ignoring and interfering in the EEZ of Greece,” he said, while also criticising Turkey’s role in Nagorno-Karabakh and Libya.
(A version of this article was originally published by the Kathimerini newspaper and is reproduced by permission.)
Ahval