At an extremely critical juncture for the future of the North Atlantic Alliance, Kyriakos Mitsotakis leaves today at noon for Madrid and the NATO Summit. Once the Prime Minister's aircraft lands in the Spanish capital, the first stop will be a reception hosted by King Felipe for the Alliance leaders.
There, of course, will also be Tayyip Erdogan, who will have arrived earlier in Madrid to have a trilateral meeting with Finnish President Nisto and Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Anderson. The royal dinner will therefore be the first "coexistence" of the two men since their meeting in Istanbul in March, which started differently and turned out differently.
The Greek government is ready for all scenarios[/B] regarding Turkey's stance[/B] and especially for the possibility that Erdogan will raise the issue of the islands at the leaders' summit, which will be held on Wednesday and Thursday. According to protothema.gr, an effort has been made by the international community in recent days to prevent Turkey from "loading the table", especially at a time when the major issue is the accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO.
It remains to be seen, therefore, how Erdogan, who has a "grand bargain" underway, will behave by using the Turkish "veto" in the Alliance. There is no doubt, however, that even if he chooses to take a softer stance at the formal session of the Summit, he will unfold his revisionist positions in his bilateral contacts. It will be crucial whether one of them will be with US President Joe Biden, who has not received him at the White House and is fully aware of the situation in our region after his conversation with Mitsotakis a month and a half ago.
Mitsotakis' "blue envelope", however, is sufficiently prepared. "The prime minister, if necessary, will speak with legal arguments, without resorting to legalisms, but also with historical and political accuracy," a competent government source explains to protothema.gr, "photographing" Mitsotakis' weapons. Apart from the invocation of international law and Turkey's a la carte interpretation of the Treaties, the Greek positions are based on the famous map of the Blue Homeland that...Turkey, on the accuracy of the Treaties that Turkey disputes, but also on Article 51 of the UN Charter, which justifies the "legitimate defence" of our country, if it is threatened through the Casus Belli of the neighbour and the presence of the "Aegean Army" on the Turkish coast. Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias was at Maximou yesterday to discuss this and much more, as the NATO summit is not about Greek-Turkish relations. The Prime Minister will be accompanied by Defence Minister Nikos Panagiotopoulos, his diplomatic advisor Anna Maria Bura and government spokesman Yannis Economou.
At the same time, the bilateral contacts that Mitsotakis will have in Madrid are also "locked". Based on the data so far, he is expected to see British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, with whom he had a telephone conversation a few days ago, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trideau and it remains to be seen who else.
Source: Proto Thema
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