FM Dendias: Turkey has no moral right to speak; it should respect int’l law and return to reason

Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias reacted immediately and in austere language vis-à-vis the latest round of Turkish rhetoric against Athens, with Tuesday’s barbs being launched from the podium of the UN General Assembly by none other than Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkey is in no position to criticize Greece over human rights, Dendias said afterwards, pointing to a state-sanctioned policy by the neighboring country to use “migration as a tool, while endangering the lives of tens of thousands of people.”

The Greek foreign minister is in New York City, accompanying PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis, for sessions of the 77th UN General Assembly.

Speaking to reporters, Dendias said Turkish leadership was “increasingly testing the limits of human reasoning”, in the wake of Erdogan’s claim of Greece “turning the Aegean into a graveyard for refugees with its unlawful and reckless pushbacks.”

The Islamist and increasingly authoritarian Turkish leader was referring to migrant boats setting off from the Turkish coast – “push forwards” – often facilitated by migrant smuggling rings for a hefty fee per head, in order to land on Greek and EU territory.

Erdogan also claimed that Athens “has been pursuing discriminatory and oppressive policies against the “Turkish Muslim minority”, a reference to the internationally recognized Muslim minority in the northeast Thrace province. Among others, the Ankara decries the fact that the Greek state appoints muftis – a quasi-legal jurist in Islamic tradition – for the Muslim minority, instead of allowing elected muftis to serve. Conversely, the same posts in Turkey are filled with state appointments.

“A country that directly threatens war, which has issued a casus belli, which has disputed Greek sovereignty of Aegean Islands, is now speaking of good neighborly relations,” Dendias remarked.

He also reminded that Turkey, which continues to occupy territory of foreign countries, including one-third of the Republic of Cyprus, audaciously speaks about building security and cooperation in the east Mediterranean.

“Greece is a European country that respects human rights, and its Muslim minority is growing, expanding and prospering … Turkey should respond on how a Greek minority in Istanbul, which once numbered 100,000 people, has been left with fewer than 5,000 people. Turkey has no right to speak, as the expression goes,” stressed.