Turkey, Greece face new Imia
By Aris Abadzis

With comments like “serious provocation by Greek soldiers” Turkish media, which had again the main role for the tension between Athens and Ankara, presented the incident, in which Turkish journalists yesterday have tried to reach the Island of Ro, to the west of the Kastelorizo Island, where the Greek shore patrol has stopped them.
“A crisis like the one with Imia but on the Karaada Island (Ro)”. That is how the news was presented on the Turkish Sabah newspaper’s webpage. The reporter, who wrote it, has been among the journalists, who tried to get to the island. It should be noticed that all the journalists are from the pro-governmental circles. The other two journalists on the ship are reporters at the Ihlas News Agency.
In an article of the newspaper, undersigned by the journalist in question, it is pointed out that the vessel, where the journalists have been, has been approached by a ship of the Greek shore patrol. The Greek soldiers detained the journalists and bound the vessel to their own ship.
Then, the patrol checked their ID cards and took photos of them. According to Sabah, a ship of the Turkish shore patrol came later and it was at a distance of 300 meters. When the Greeks stopped questioning, at 18:12 they left the journalists alone. Their ship came back to Kas in Antalya.
Almost the same information was issued by other media in Turkey. The TV channel Kanal D talked about a “serious provocation”. The same TV channel presented images from the Island of Ro and emphasized that Greece, in unprecedented way, has established some dominance on the island and statements that Greek military men are on the island.
In fact, all the Turkish media comments on the “dominance on the island, which is not part of Greece or Turkey. In other words, the issue becomes part of the theory of “grey areas” in the Aegean Sea, which Turkey launches. In its efforts, some time ago, Ankara made even the Island of Gavdos part of the “grey areas”!

FOCUS News Agency reminds:
The Imia Island, or Kardak in Turkish, was the reason for a conflict between Greece and Turkey in 1996. At that time two Turkish journalists set the Turkish flag on a desolate island, where the Greek flag was set in 1995. 24 ships of the Greek fleet surrounded the island. Within several days the conflict was solved in diplomatic way and both states had to pull their forces out of the region.
“Grey areas”, as a concept, was introduced by Turkey and Ankara uses it to mark its policy line of challenging the statute of uncertain number of islands and islets. The most popular example in this reference is the dispute on the Imia/Kardak Island in the Aegean Sea, because of which both sides were very close to war. The ‘grey areas” is an element of the so-called Aegean dispute, which includes debatable issues between Greece and Turkey about the sovereignty and the relevant rights in the region of the Aegean Sea. Some of the problems are the delimitation of territorial waters, air space, exclusive economic zones, the using of the continental shelf, the fixing of air control zones and their importance for the control over air force flights and the demilitarized statute of some Greek islands in the region.