Turkey takes umbrage at Greek sea park projects

Greece's marine park projects in the Aegean and Ionian seas have miffed Turkey, which views them as an underhanded attempt to extend Greek sovereignty over what it calls "gray zones."

Actually, no "gray zones" exist: the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne delimited sovereignty over most of the Aegean. The remaining area, in the southeastern Aegean, which was occupied by Italy from the Ottoman Empire in 1911-12 and ceded to Greece by treaty in 1947, was delimited in the 1932 Convention between Italy and Turkey.

These facts have not prevented Turkey from compiling a list of some 150 islands, some populated, whose sovereignty it claims has not been determined by any treaty.

During Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis' recent visit to Ankara, which took place in mid-May, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed his annoyance at the projects, albeit in a measured tone.