Standing opposed the politics of Greek populism, lies and misery

The name dispute issue with Skopje is of fundamental importance to all Greek people. Regrettably, it has been hijacked by demagogues preoccupied with fulfilling their own (and their internal/external patron sponsors) personal and political agendas. It is farcical that the major political parties in Greece do not have a uniform approach to this issue and have failed to achieve national consensus. The absence of a common front and national planning has resulted in a serious risk that Greece will be defeated in this matter. Responsibility lays on the entire political spectrum and media outlets that continue to mislead and invest in political division and commotion. 

However, the greatest problem facing Greece today is not the name dispute with Skopje – it is the economy and rapid population decline. These two problems are intertwined and directly linked to the country's foreign policy. Both have severe ramifications on our relations with Turkey, our greatest threat, and our neighbours in the Balkan peninsula. After all, the ability to exercise foreign influence is primarily dependant on the internal strength of a state and Greece, with its current social/political divisions, economic turmoil and aging population, is lacking in such dynamism. 

Similarly, population balances in the Balkans are quickly being overturned. The population of Turkey and the number of Albanians in the Balkan peninsula is rising rapidly. In contrast, in Greece there is a demographic contraction. Eurostat estimates that by the year 2080 the population of Greece will have fallen by 3.5 million! As a result, the Greek nation is shrinking with all the inevitable consequences that frequently follow. Besides, in geopolitics there are no gaps since increasing populations will always desire to fill the gaps left by declining populations.

Unfortunately, young Greek people continue to emigrate abroad, and the ones staying behind are not bearing many children. As long as the economy remains weak and unemployment high, this downward spiral will continue. The economy will remain weak if we refuse to impose the appropriate reforms and structural changes that the country needs and we continue to invest in polarisation and controversy. It will remain weak if we constantly demand change of governments, if we continue to blame others and never take ownership of our wrongdoings and seek to immediately redress them. With ongoing strikes, demonstrations, aphorisms and the politics of misery, Greece will not go forward. In such a climate of uncertainty, one cannot expect investment and growth or the return of young people to Greece. 

Issues such as sub-replacement fertility and creating incentives to attract the return of people who recently migrated abroad, including some second and third generation Greeks living abroad, remain outside the political agenda. The reason they do so is simple. These issues do not sell, they do not polarise, they do not immediately bring party political benefits. A protest rally for these issues will never take place and as long as Greeks continue to focus on the tree and lose sight of the forest, this will never change. 

Within this fluid state, Greece is today called upon to carefully manoeuvre between the Scylla of populism and the Charybdis of deceit whilst simultaneously standing its ground in an aggressive neighbourhood. But today cannot come from yesterday only nor from the proponents of loud, proud and ignorant. The future cannot be built on jingoisms, whipping up passion, lies and false dilemmas. The power of Greece is commensurate with its knowledge. As long as the citizens of Greece permit themselves to be deceived by populism, by false and misleading media reports and Facebook rants, the country will remain weak and its citizens will continue to suffer. 

It is imperative that we stand up and oppose those who wish to immobilize every attempt to escape our current predicament. That we oppose the cycle of fanaticism, misinformation and instability. Let us refuse to adhere to hollow reflex politics. Against populism, lies and misery, let us uphold a new patriotism. A new patriotism based on the renewal of knowledge. One that is not afraid to speak the truth and is able to balance vision and popular desire with diplomacy and realism. 

Vasilis Theodosiou Giavris

(Lawyer - Political Scientist)

Melbourne, February 15, 2018

NATO deployment in the Aegean Sea and Greek issues of concern

The recent decision by the Greek and Turkish governments, albeit after much political pressure been applied by the EU, to allow deployment of a NATO fleet in the Aegean Sea should raise some fundamental issues of concern for Greece. 

The NATO fleet is said to conduct reconnaissance, monitoring and surveillance to provide information to Greece, Turkey and the EU (via its agency Frontex) to deal with traffickers and help stem refugees entering Greece from Turkey.

However, both NATO and the EU have never recognized Greece’s territorial sea borders nor have they accepted Greece’s declared airspace zone. Indeed, both organisations have been a "hesitant observer" in this regard. Both have traditionally chosen to adopt a “hands off” policy toward Greek-Turkish disputes in the Aegean Sea and have refrained from undertaking any active dispute resolution measures.

As such, the recent declaration by NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Standing Maritime Group 2 that:

“Greek and Turkish forces will not operate in each other’s territorial waters and airspace” and that “NATO vessels can deploy in the territorial waters of Greece and Turkey” 

assumes that such waters and airspace have been agreed upon. This cannot be further from the truth and therein lay the following concerns for Greece:

• Greece has declared a 10 nautical mile territorial air defense zone for aviation and air policing purposes. Turkey objects to this declaration and only recognizes Greek sovereignty over 6 nautical miles. Will Greek airplanes be precluded from operating in the “disputed” 4 nautical mile zone? 
• Turkey erroneously challenges the sovereignty of numerous small islands, islets and rocks in the Aegean Sea that, according to Turkey, have not been specifically ceded to Greece by way of international treaties. Will Greek ships and planes be precluded from operating in Greece’s declared territorial sea and airspace zones emanating from these islands? 
• Will Greek vessels and airplanes be limited to operate only at non contested waters and airspace? If so, could this not potentially be exploited by Turkey and used to set a precedent for claims over disputed territorial waters and airspace zones?
• Greece has consistently refused to concede that a territorial sea dispute per se exists with Turkey but rather promotes the view that the claims made by Turkey are unilateral in nature. Does the agreed NATO deployment affect this position?

The above questions reflect serious concerns which emanate from the current presence of NATO forces in the Aegean Sea. One hopes that the Greek government has appropriately considered these issues and has mitigated all risks. There is no doubt that Greece must actively work towards appropriately dealing with the unfolding humanitarian crisis and should engage the international community to help do so. However, the presence of NATO forces should not constitute a de-facto dereliction of Greek entitlements and sovereignty in the Aegean Sea.

by Vasilis Giavris (Lawyer & Political Scientist) 

http://vasilisgiavris.blogspot.com.au/

Turkey & Greece, Airspace violations and International Law: What's good for the goose is good for the gander?

by Vasilis Giavris (Lawyer & Political Scientist)

The recent decision by Turkey to shoot down a Russian military plane for allegedly entering Turkish airspace for a few seconds and the statement by US President Obama that Turkey had a right to defend its airspace has rightly raised the issue of the continued violation of Greek airspace by Turkey. After all, despite inherent inadequacies international law cannot be selectively applied and must not equate to the rendering of justice with double standards.

Turkish Violations of Greek Airspace 

Turkey violates Greek Airspace daily. Indeed, it has been well published that only in 2014 Turkey violated Greek Airspace 2,244 times! As a result, for many years both Greece and Turkey have engaged in aerial fights which have resulted in mid-air collisions and in May 2006 the unfortunate death of a Greek pilot.

Issues of Legal Dispute: 

• Demarcation of Aegean Sea Airspace

It is a customary rule of international law that a state is entitled to the sovereignty of the airspace above its territory and its territorial waters. This is reflected in Article 2 of UNCLOS III which expands the sovereignty of a state to include the airspace above its territorial waters. Similarly, Article 1 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation 1944 (ICAO) provides that “every state has complete and exclusive sovereignty over the airspace of its territory”, whilst Article 2 of the ICAO defines territory as including the land areas and territorial waters adjacent thereto that are within a state's sovereignty.

Greece established its air zone in 1931 by Presidential Decree 5017/1931 pursuant to which Greece declared a 10 nautical mile territorial sea and air defence zone for aviation and air policing purposes. In effect Greece has established two different limits for its territorial sea. It retained a 3 nautical mile territorial zone of general application, which was expanded to 6 nautical miles in 1936, and a ten nautical mile limit for aviation and air control. Greece justifies its practice of having a twofold hybrid arrangement on acquired historic rights and local customs founded on long standing practices. It should be noted that these practices did not raise any objection or protestation from any other state including Turkey until 1975, that is, 44 years after the 10 nautical mile air zone was established. As such, Greece correctly maintains that Turkey is legally prevented from objecting to such practice.

Greece further justifies its practice on the basis of its entitlement to extend its territorial waters to 12 nautical miles pursuant to Article 3 of UNCLOS III. This does not preclude Greece, under international law, from defining its territorial waters at a distance of 10 nautical miles from its coasts for aviation and air policing purposes. As such Greece contends that it had chosen to exercise its full sovereignty with regard to the six nautical mile limit and less than full sovereignty to the belt between six and ten nautical miles from its coasts. 

It should be noted that the only reason Greece has not extended its territorial waters to 12 nautical miles (but has always reserved the right to do so in the future) is the declaration by the Turkish Parliament that such extension would constitute a casus belli, i.e. reason to go to war. 

Turkey opposes the 10 nautical mile national airspace claim articulated by Greece on the basis that it exceeds the territorial sea of Greece. Turkey contends that the Greek claims lack any precedents and views the airspace between Greece’s 6 nautical mile territorial waters and it’s declared 10 nautical miles national airspace as being part of international airspace. This, according to Turkey, permits Turkish military planes to enter such space without any permission from Greece. 

• Flight Information Centre (FIR’S)

The dispute over airspace use is not limited to territorial airspace but rather extends to the Flight Information Regime (FIR) in the Aegean. In 1951 the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) granted air traffic control responsibility for the Aegean FIR to Greece and fixed the demarcation line between Istanbul and the Athens FIR at the median line between the eastern Aegean Greek islands and the Turkish coast. Turkey did not oppose this demarcation until 1974 when, subsequent to the Turkish invasion of Cyprus, it protested over the Greek ten nautical mile territorial airspace claim and issued a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) 714 demanding that all aircraft provide a flight plan to Turkey when crossing the median line in the Aegean between Greece and Turkey. Greece immediately responded by issuing NOTAM 1018 which deemed the Turkish notice to be in breach of ICAO rules and as lacking legal merit. Greece followed this with NOTAM 1157 which, subject to some minor exceptions, declared the airspace in the Aegean Sea a danger zone resulting in all international airlines suspending routes between Turkey and Greece. These were only reinstated in 1980 when both countries withdrew their respective NOTAM’s and the established FIR status quo was returned.

It is commonly accepted that Turkey intentionally infringes air traffic regulations in a concerted effort to link the airspace issue with the continental shelf dispute and challenge the existing status quo in the Aegean Sea. Greece maintains that Article 3(d) and Article 39(3) of UNCLOSS III requires military planes to observe the rules of the air as established by the ICAO and as such requires Turkish military planes to submit their military flight plans to Greece prior to entering the Athens FIR. This is required so that the safety of civilian flights can be secured and effectively applied. Not surprisingly, Turkey continues to refuse to submit flight plans for its military aircraft to Greece.

The adoption of a policy of “repeated violations” whereby without any permission from Greece Turkey continues to use the airspace beyond the 6 nautical mile territorial sea of Greece for military flights needs to immediately end. The US, NATO and the EU need to insist on the uniform application of international law. After all "what's good for the goose must be good for the gander".

The refugee crisis must not be used as a vehicle for Turkey to assert sovereignty in the Aegean Sea

by Vasilis Giavris (Lawyer and Political Scientist)

"Greece has only de facto, and also temporary, rule over EGAYDAAK and its administration there does not invalidate the fact that those islands are the territory of the Republic of Turkey,"

*Turkish Minister of Defence, İsmet Yılmaz, (Statement made in March 2015) 

"I suggested, and came across with strong reactions, Greeks and Turks to form together a coastguard which will patrol the sea areas between Turkey and the Greek islands. Turks agree, Greeks don’t,...should we fight over for a sea area of 10 kilometers wide, who is responsible and where or should we try to save human lives?”.  

*Jean-Claude Juncker President of European Commission (Statement made in November 2015)

The magnitude and gravity of the refugee crisis in Europe makes it imperative that both Greece and Turkey work together to find ways to avert refugee suffering and deaths, deal with security issues and fight human trafficking. However, Turkey must not be permitted to use the refugee crisis as a vehicle to assert sovereignty over Greek islands, waters, airspace and continental sea shelf. 

Recent commentary stemming from the European Union about joint patrols and cost guards in the Aegean Sea at best fail to recognise that Turkey continues to challenge and dispute the sovereignty of numerous Greek islands, islets and rocks in the Aegean Sea. According to Turkey, such territories have not been specifically ceded to Greece by way of international treaties and are "grey zones". In effect Turkey refuses to recognise EU borders in the Aegean Sea. 

Turkey continues to maintain that no agreement concerning the delimitation of maritime boundaries between the two countries exist in the Aegean Sea and as such these are territories without sovereignty and therefore stateless! 

Turkey has gone as far as to claim that 132 islands and islets in the Aegean, currently under Greek administration, belong to Turkey including five Greek inhabited islets in the proximity of Samos and the Dodecanese that have been under Greek administration since 1912 and 1947 respectively. 

Legality of Turkish Claims

The claims made by Turkey lack legal merit under international treaty and customary law. Greece, quite rightly, denies the existence of any grey zones in the Aegean Sea and denies the existence of any dispute in this regard. The issue of sovereignty in the region has long been settled by the Lausanne Peace Treaty of 1923 and the Paris Peace Treaty of 1947. 

The Lausanne Peace Treaty 1923, to which both Greece and Turkey are signatories, settled the Anatolian and East Thracian parts of the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire and the borders between Greece and Turkey. Pursuant to Article 12 (1) of this Treaty, the islands of the Eastern Mediterranean including Lemnos, Samothrace, Mytilene, Chios, Samos and Nikaria were ceded to Greece whilst the islands of Imbros, Tenedos, the Rabbit Islands and islands situated at less than three miles from the Asiatic coast remained under Turkish sovereignty. 

Pursuant to Article 15 of the Lausanne Peace Treaty 1923, Turkey renounced in favour of Italy all rights and title over the Dodecanese islands, Kastellorizo and the islets dependent thereon. Moreover, pursuant to Article 14 of the Paris Peace Treaty of 1947, signed by Italy and the allied powers after the culmination of World War II, Italy ceded full sovereignty over the Dodecanese islands as well as the adjacent islets to Greece. 

This treaty makes it clear that all islands and islets situated outside the three mile zone around the Turkish mainland coast, other than the islands of Imbros, Tenedos and the Rabbit Islands, have been awarded to Greece and those located within this zone awarded to Turkey. 

The demarcation is clear-cut which explains why there is no need for these treaties to refer by name to all the islands and islets especially given that there are over two thousand islands and islets involved. Turkey erroneously interprets this provision to mean that all islands and islets not specifically named in Article 12 or not specifically ceded to Greece by way of Treaty belong to Turkey as the rightful heir to the Ottoman Empire or otherwise remain as "grey zones" that need to be delimited by way of agreement between Turkey and Greece. 

Whilst it is important that Greece and Turkey work together on refugees this does not have to be at the expense of the implementation of United Nations Resolutions, International Conventions, European Acquis and International Law in the Aegean Sea.

Aegean Sea Dispute in Context: Delimitation of the Continental Shelf

by Vasilis Giavris - Lawyer & Political Scientist

It is generally accepted that the delimitation of the continental shelf boundary in the Aegean Sea first became an issue of contention between Greece and Turkey on November 1, 1973 when the Turkish government decided to unilaterally grant permits to the Turkish State Petroleum Company for the exploration and exploitation of the seabed of the Aegean Sea surrounding the Greek islands of Samothrace, Limnos, Agios Eustratios, Lesbos, Chios, Psara and Antipsara. Turkey followed this decision by publishing in the Turkish Government Gazette a map which effectively drew the line of delimitation between Greece and Turkey in the middle of the Aegean Sea and failed to account for the existence of the Greek islands. 

Turkey’s actions drew an immediate protest from the Greek Government which on 7 February 1974 addressed a Note Verbale to the government of Turkey in which it disputed the validity of Turkey’s actions and reserved Greece’s sovereign rights over the continental shelf of the above named islands (Greek Note Verbale No.6243-29/AS 103, 7 February 1974). Whilst both states initially agreed to enter into some form of negotiations to deal with the issue in dispute this agreement was quickly abandoned as a result of the illegal invasion of Cyprus by Turkey in 1974 and by the Turkish decision in 1976 to authorize further Turkish ships to undertake explorations in the disputed areas. 

Nature of dispute 

There is a divergence of opinion as to the exact limit of the dispute in question. Greece perceives the dispute to be limited to the continental shelf adjacent to the Greek islands of Samothrace, Limnos, Agios Eustratios, Lesbos, Chios, Psara, Antipsara, Samos, Ikaria, and the islands comprising the Dodecanese group. On the contrary, Turkey maintains the view that the dispute applies to the whole of the Aegean Sea and as such is not limited to particular islands.

Both states revert to legal arguments to support their respective claims. Greece correctly articulates the view that islands are entitled to their own continental shelf and in this regard points to Article 1(b) of the Convention on the Continental Shelf 1958 which states that the term “continental shelf” also applies to the seabed and subsoil of submarine areas adjacent to the coasts of islands. Greece further relies on Article 121(2) of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982 (UNCLOS III) which states that “the territorial sea, the contiguous zone, the exclusive economic zone and the continental shelf of an island are determined in accordance with the provisions of this Convention applicable to other land territory” and as such, according to Greece, reinforces the argument that islands do have their own economic zone and continental shelf. 

Finally, Greece quite rightly points to Article 6(1) of the Convention on the Continental Shelf 1958 which states that in circumstances where an agreement cannot be reached between states, and unless there are special circumstances that justify another determination, the boundary is to be determined by a median line, every point of which is equidistant from the nearest point of the baseline of each state (Greek Note Verbale No.6243-29/AS 103, 7 February 1974). According to Greece, this point can only be the median line between the Greek islands of the eastern Aegean and the Turkish coast..

Turkey, which is not a signatory of UNCLOS III, refuses to be bound by its provisions. It denies that Greek islands possess continental shelves of their own but rather ironically perceives them as “protuberances” of the Turkish continental shelf and a “prolongation of the Anatolian landmass”. Turkey further claims that “special” circumstances apply to the Aegean Sea. In particular, Turkey claims that failing to achieve agreement on the delimitation line then both states need to define their respective continental shelf areas by taking into consideration factors such as the “geomorphologic and geological structure of the shelf” and special circumstances including the “general configuration of the respective coasts, the existence of islands, islets or rocks of one State on the continental shelf of the other”. 

Greece does not accept the special circumstances claimed by Turkey. On the contrary, it claims that if special circumstances are deemed to exist they must favour Greece since the “Archipelagic unity” of the Greek islands should not be interrupted by the imposition of Turkey’s continental shelf.     

It is imperative that Greece continues to make it clear to all and sundry that resolution to long standing disputes can only be achieved by insisting on the implementation of United Nations Resolutions, International Conventions, European Acquis and International Law.