Category Archives: Eastern Mediterranean

Understanding Turkey’s Cyprus Problem

On the 28th of December, the Cypriot President Demetris Christofias announced that the Aphrodite Block 12 field off the coast of Cyprus contains between 5 and 8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, which “opens up great potential for Cyprus and its people,” he said. Now the question is whether the gas find might also create a new dynamic which could lead to greater regional cooperation and a faster solution to the Cyprus problem.

Apart from President Christofias many other officials and academics supported the idea that the discovery of natural gas could make the conditions for a settlement more favourable. This notion implies, among other things, that Turkey will recognise the great interest it has from a future settlement in Cyprus; that it will appreciate how it could benefit from a future joint exploitation of the natural gas by the two communities under a federal state; as well as the possibilities of cooperation between Cyprus and itself, in consuming and transporting the gas. This is not implausible. And no one could question the benefits that Turkey would have from the implementation of such a scenario. However, this logic does not take into account the coercive attitude and unproductive diplomacy that Turkey has been pursuing of late. Moreover, this rosy picture also does not consider the other external relations of Turkey such as with the EU, nor the state’s domestic politics. Thus, while we cannot exclude the possibility that Turkey will change its stance, at the same time, the realities we have at hand do not leave us much space for optimism.

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The Future of Energy Security in Southeastern Europe and the Establishment of the Greek EEZ

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Given the growing interest in the energy developments of the Eastern Mediterranean, and Southeastern Europe more generally, this article looks at the importance of this region for the energy security of Europe, and more specifically the European Union (EU), focusing on what role Greece could or should play through the establishment of its own Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).

Setting the Geographical Framework

Since we are referring to Southeastern Europe we should first, briefly, set the geographical boundaries of this region. The name Southeastern Europe was firstly used in 1863 by Johann Georg von Hahn and it came to be a synonym to, and characterize the Balkan Peninsula.[1] Other scholars argued for a wider Southeastern Europe that extends as far as Turkey, Cyprus, and even, for example, Georgia, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Ukraine.[2] Leaving aside the long-standing debate on the boundaries of Europe, we would argue that given the UN map of Europe[3] and the present geographical boundaries of the EU, including the candidate states for EU membership, Southeastern Europe includes the Balkans in the West, Turkey in the East, the Greek Islands and Cyprus in the South, and extends, roughly, to Ukraine in the North.[4]

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Turkey: Zero Chances for "Zero Problems"

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Since the election of Justice and Development Party (AKP) to power in 2002, Turkey followed a different foreign policy orientation. The man behind this foreign policy shift was Ahmet Davutoglu, today’s Foreign Minister. Davutoglu had a whole new idea about how the goals of Turkish foreign policy should be pursued and in his book “Strategic Depth” (Stratejik Derinlik) (2001) he brilliantly drafts a strategic doctrine for Turkey’s new foreign policy. Despite its relative success, this doctrine is seriously challenged by many regional developments, which are making it hard to believe that its implementation could ever be possible.

“Zero Problems”

A central theme of Davutoglu’s, and Turkey’s, foreign policy doctrine is the “zero problems with neighbors” principle. In brief, this suggests that Turkey wants to re-engage with the Arab world and the broader region more generally, by playing the role of the peace broker and mediator for regional disputes and conflicts. Based on “zero problems” Turkey is willing to abandon its crisis prone attitude and resort to “soft power”, cultural and historical bonds with its neighbors, and create economic and political relations of interdependence between the states of the Middle East and beyond, in order to resolve any bilateral or regional problems. At the same time Turkey is not neglecting the good relations that it should maintain with international actors like the US, EU and Russia. However, the last few months Turkish foreign policy has been facing quite a few problems not only in its region but also internationally. This has led many analysts to reconsider the feasibility of the “zero problems” principles and the goals of the Turkish foreign policy themselves.

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Eastern Mediteranean: Energy Developments and Geopolitical Implications

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Zenonas Tziarras
(PhD (Cand.) Politics & International Studies, University of Warwick, UK)

Since the drillings at block 12 in Cyprus’ Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) for the finding of natural gas were announced a few months ago, a diplomatic crisis, which later became a real threat to the regional stability and security, begun to unfold. Israel and Greece are directly involved in Cyprus’ efforts to drill out its natural gas; the former because of the geographic proximity of its own underwater energy reserves to the Cypriot block, and the latter because of the common Turkish disputes it faces regarding its marine borders, the strong diplomatic and economic bonds it maintains with Cyprus, the economic benefits of exploiting its own underwater energy resources and the need to delimitate its own EEZ.

The circumstances under which these developments have occurred could have probably not been worse given the general instability in the regions due to the Arab Spring, the decline in the Turkish-Israeli relations, the re-ignition of the Kurdish problem, the escalating Syrian crisis and of course the economic crisis. Apart from Cyprus, Greece and Israel, there are other actors involved in this situation and parallel realities that could play a significant role in exacerbating the crisis, leading to unfortunate security consequences.

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