PM Erdogan on the left and Papandreou on the right...There is some hope that the two day visit by PM Erdogan of Turkey today in Athens will renew the talks about a new era of cooperation between the two NATO countries which are meant to be allies.
There are air chases over the Agean sea on a weekly basis between Hellenic F16 fighters and Turkish war planes and this has been going on for the last 10 years. Despite assurances given before by PM Erdogan the Turkish military has not stopped entering Greek air space. The dispute is about whether the 100's of Greek islands in the Aegean sea have a 12 mile zone or 6. Turkey claims it can only be 6 whilst Greece states that under international law they are allowed to extend the zone to 12. The Cyprus problem is also a matter under discussion. Lets hope that these two progressive and forward thinking politicians can manage to convince their respective sides that the dispute is pointless and costly. Both Greece and Turkey spend more than 3% of GDP on defence which is very high compared with other NATO countries (Greece spend 3.3% of GDP last year higher than Britain)
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