REASONS WHY 2022 WILL BE A TOUGH YEAR FOR GREEK TURKISH RELATIONS

 The last few days herald a difficult year for Greek  Turkish relations.  This assessment is supported by:

1.  The international situation in Turkey/

As the Turkish economy is in turmoil, President Erdogan will be hard-pressed to change Turkey's tarnished image.

Deollit Burceli, Erdogan's nationalist ally, will help the Turkish President to boost Turkish pride.  The Kurdish, and Cyprus issues and terrible relations with Greece have always lent themselves to political ends and electionary purposes in Turkey. 

2. The hardening of Turkey's position towards Greece and Cyprus.  Last July, Turkish diplomacy proceeded to expand its "negotiations curriculum" with Greece. In letters from the representative of Turkey to the United Nations, Feridum Sinirlioglu. it added the demilitarisation of Greek islands as a precondition for the recognition of Greek sovereignty over them is completely unsustainable from a legal standpoint and a politically unacceptable position. Thus, the Turkish request for demilitarisation was linked to the sovereignty of the Greek islands such as Lesvos, Samos, Chios, Limnos and Samothraki. This is an unprecedented distortion of the provision of the Treaty of Lausanne. 

3. The election timing in Greece, Cyprus and Turkey. 2023 is an election year in all three countries. This situation will render it difficult, over the course of 2022, which is pre-election year in all three countries, for the possibility of moderate movements on the political-diplomatic chessboard.  The responsibilities lie with the Turkish side.  This is confirmed by the hardening of position with aircraft and drones conducting overflights above the Greek islands and with fierce rhetoric against Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Nikos Dendias, and the President of the Greek Republic, Katerina Sakellaropoulou.  

4. The tension in public and rhetoric and diplomacy. 

The already strident public rhetoric in Greek Turkish relations is expected to intensify on the occasion of 100th anniversary of the destruction of Smirni and the violent expulsion of the Greeks of Asia Minor. It should be borne in mind that 2023 will be a double centenary on one hand, since the foundation of the Turkish republic and on the other side the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne, which constitutes the institutional foundation of the status quo in the Aegean and the eastern Mediterranean challenged by Turkey.  

5. The Turkish view of defense shielding Greece proceeded, as it should have, of strengthening its defense,.  No one knows how some hotheads in Ankara assessed this.  Then there is the migration issue, recently in addition to the repeated Turkish slander against Greece, there has been a resumption of illegal migration flows that may increase, especially if there is a recession in the pandemic.

The combination of all this obliges Greece to be constantly calm and vigorous against any political conception that has its core in "casus belli", the active diplomatic and operational containment policy systematically implemented by the government becomes the only option.  Only in this way can substantive conditions for a strictly demarcated dialogue with Turkey be created.

Until then, we need to be calm and determined.