MHP leader warns against US bases in Greece
ANKARA
Nine military bases established by the United States in Greece are a threat to Turkey’s national security, the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli said on May 31.
“With its harassment and provocations, Greece is playing with fire,” Bahçeli said addressing his party members in parliament.
The MHP assesses this a threat with the argument that the U.S. uses Greece as a “pawn” and dragging Turkey “into the abyss of strategic preoccupation and trying to push it into a hot conflict environment,” he stated.
Greece should return 12 islands to Turkey, the politician said.
“The subject of 12 islands is our wound that has not yet healed. They have been unjustly usurped from Turkey by foot tricks. The stolen property must be returned to its owner,” Bahçeli said.
Bahçeli said the width of Turkey’s territorial waters in the Aegean is 6 nautical miles, and added, ”The aim of Greece to increase this width to 12 miles will never be possible without bloodshed and weapons.”
The Turkish nation will not tolerate Greece, which pursues an “aggressive and expansionist” policy from the opposite shore of the Aegean, the MHP leader said.
“We have not forgotten the 12 islands. We will not forget them, and we will definitely see the days when they will return to their original owners,” he stated.
Treaty of Lausanne, signed in 1923 following the end of World War I, envisages non-militarization of these islands.
Greece has been arming these Aegean islands since the early 1960s despite objections by Turkey.
In 1947, the Treaty of Paris was signed with the Allied countries and these islands were ceded from Italy to Greece.
