FM Avramopoulos holds talks with UN’s Ban Ki-moon

Greek Foreign Minister Dimitris Avramopoulos, speaking after his meeting with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at the international organisation's headquarters on Thursday evening, said that Greece has delivered a verbal note to the UN "for our rights to be consolidated that emanate from the common law, as well as the contract law of the sea".

Avramopoulos said that the Greek government, "in July 2012, made a demarche to Turkey on the granting of research licences, in regions of the Greek continental shelf, to the Turkish oil company. Because, in the period that lapsed since then, Turkey did not revoke these grants - without of course going ahead with research and I wish to believe that it will not do so in the future - we considered as next step to communicate this issue with a verbal note to the United Nations Organisation for our rights to be consolidated which emanate from the common law, as well as the contract law of the sea. Meaning that the islands have a continental shelf and that the regions in which Turkey granted the research come under the regions of the Greek continental shelf. Greece desires friendship and cooperation with Turkey, as well as with all the countries of our region, through relations, however, based on mutual respect and legality, particularly when this concerns issues touching on sovereign rights of ours as well as the exploitation of natural resources in a period when growth is what is required for Greece and Europe".