Greece–Turkey relations

Headline text

Relations between Greece and Turkey have been marked by alternating periods of mutual hostility and reconciliation ever since Greece won its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1832. Since then there have been four wars between the two countries - the Greco-Turkish War (1897), the Balkan Wars of 1912 to 1913, the First World War (1914 to 1918) and the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922).

Ottoman era

The Greek state which became independent in 1832 consisted only of the Greek mainland south of a line from Arta to Volos plus Euboia and the Cyclades. The rest of the Greek-speaking lands, including Crete and the rest of the Aegean islands, Epirus, Thessaly, Macedonia and Thrace, remained under Ottoman rule. More than a million Greeks also lived in what is now Turkey, mainly in the Ionian region around İzmir (called Smyrna by its Greek inhabitants) and in the Pontic region on the Black Sea coast.

Greek politicians of the 19th century were determined to obtain all these territories for a greatly enlarged Greek state, with Constantinople as its capital. Constantinople (now Istanbul) was the capital of the Eastern (ie Greek) half of the Roman Empire until is fall to the Turks in 1453. This was called the Great Idea (Megali Idea). The Ottomans naturally opposed these plans, and relations between Greece and the Ottoman state were always tense as a result. Greek nationalist feeling was aroused by regular nationalist revolts against Ottoman rule, particularly in Crete, which the Ottomans suppressed with considerable brutality.

During the Crimean War (1854 to 1856), Britain and France had to restrain Greece from attacking the Ottomans, by occupying Piraeus. Again during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877 the Greeks were keen to join in and liberate Greek lands from the Ottomans, but Greece was unable to take any real part in the war. Nevertheless the Congress of Berlin in 1881 gave Greece most of Thessaly and part of Epirus.

In 1897 a new revolt in Crete led to the first Greco-Turkish War. The Greeks were unable to dislodge the Ottomans from their fortifications along the northern border and the war ended in humiliation for Greece, with some small losses of territory. This war aroused Turkish nationalist sentiment within the Ottoman Empire and made the position of Greeks in the Empire worse.

The Young Turks, who seized power in the Ottoman Empire in 1907, were Turkish nationalists whose objective was to create a strong, centrally governed state. The Christian minorities, the Greeks and Armenians, saw their position in the Empire deteriorate. Crete was once again the flashpoint of Greek and Turkish nationalism. This led directly to the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913, in which Greece seized Crete, the islands, the rest of Thessaly and Epirus, and coastal Macedonia from the Ottomans, in alliance with Serbia and Bulgaria. As the influence of the Young Turks grew, Greeks, especially Pontian Greeks, were subjected to mass killings and deportations.

The First World War and after

Greece entered the First World War with the intention of seizing Constantinople (ie, Istanbul) and Smyrna (ie, Izmir) from the Ottomans, with the encouragement of Britain and France, who also promised the Greeks Cyprus. Although there was little direct fighting between Greeks and Turks, when the Ottoman Empire collapsed in 1918 the Greeks were quick to claim the lands the Allies had promised them. The Treaty of Sèvres (1920) gave Greece eastern Thrace and a large area of western Anatolia around Smyrna. This Treaty was signed by the Ottoman Governement but was, however, never legally ratified.

Greece occupied Smyrna on May 15th 1919. Mustafa Kemal (later Atatürk) landed in Samsun on May 19th 1919, this is regarded as the beginning of the Turkish War of Independence. Kemal established a nationalist movement to repel the armies that had occupied Turkey (including Italy, France and Britain) and establish new borders for a sovereign Turkish nation. Having created a separate government in Ankara, Kemal's government did not recognise the Treaty of Sevres which the Sultans government accepted, and fought to have it revoked. The Greek advances into Anatolia were eventually checked and the Greek army was forced into retreat.

The Turks reoccupied Asia Minor and entered Smyrna/Izmir on 9 September 1922. The Greek army and administration had already left by sea and the city was undefended. Many Greeks feared Turkish attacks in the wake of the capture of the city, possibly due to events that the pro-Turkish British High Commissioner Sir H. Rumbold described to Lord Curzon as inhumane acts committed by the Greek army in their retreat (note that similar accusations exist against the turkish army in their actions against greek civilians). The Greek retreat involved a scorched earth policy, this left large tracts of land and property ruined or destroyed. The burning of crops left the inhabitants of Smyrna close to starvation. With the possibility of social disorder once the Turkish army occupied Smyrna, Kemal was quick to issue a proclamation, sentencing any Turkish soldier to death who harmed non-combatants.

Feelings ran high however, many Turkish soldiers massacred Greek and Armenians. An american observer estimated the total deaths, from all causes, to be around 2,000 people, whilst a later study estimated the total number of people who perished to be up to 100,000. Some sources accuse the Turkish commander Nureddin Pasha of playing a direct role in the violence, others show the fighting to be of a sporadic and individual kind. During the hostilities, a fire had left Smyrna devastated. The cause of the fire is disputed, some opinions puts the blame on fleeing Greek troops, other accounts say it was started by Turkish troops who were looting shops. However, dominant opinion believes the fire to have escalated beyond control with Turkish troops creating fires whilst destroying the Armenian quarter and 'rounding up' its population, while a strong wind carried the flames across flimsily constructed buildings. George Horton, the Consul General of the United States in Smyrna at the time, criticised the actions of the Turkish army in Smyrna greatly and accused them of inhumane and brutal action actions against civilians. [[1]]

In the wake of this conflict there was a violent reaction against the Greek communities throughout Turkey, who were seen as disloyal since they identified more with their Greek heritage and Greece than Turkey. The central government made use of this prevalent attitude to continue its policy of ethnic cleansing. Ethnic and religious minorities in Turkey suffered lootings and massacres. To end this situation, the Treaty of Lausanne of July 1923 provided for an exchange of populations between Greece and Turkey. About one and a half million Greeks left Turkey for Greece and about half a million Turks left Greece for Turkey (note that the population exchange was on religious grounds, thus the exchange was officially that of Christians and Muslims). The exceptions to the population exchange were Istanbul and the island of Imbros and Tenedos, where the Greek minority (including the Ecumenical Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church) was allowed to stay, and the eastern part of Greek Thrace, whose Turkish/Muslim minority was also allowed to stay. Due to the failure of the invasion and the heavy loss of life, Greece refers to the events following World War I as the Asia Minor Catastrophe/Disaster.

Between conflicts

The postwar leaders of Turkey and Greece, Kemal Atatürk and Eleftherios Venizelos, were determined to establish normal relations between the two states. After years of negotiations, a treaty was concluded in 1930, and Venizelos made a successful visit to Istanbul and Ankara. Greece renounced all its claims to Turkish territory. This was followed by the Balkan Pact of 1934, in which Greece and Turkey joined Kingdom of Yugoslavia, Romania and Albania in a treaty of mutual assistance and settled outstanding issues (Bulgaria refused to join). Both leaders recognising the need for peace resulted in more friendly relations, with Venizelos even nominating Atatürk for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1934.

The main irritant to Turkish-Greek relations was now Cyprus, a British protectorate whose population was 80 percent Greek and 20 percent Turkish. The Greek Cypriots desired unity (enosis) with Greece, and in 1931 there were nationalist riots in Nicosia. The Turks opposed this, desiring that the British stay in Cyprus, fearing for basic existence. The Greek government was forced by its financial and diplomatic dependence on Britain to disavow any desire for unification with Cyprus.

During World War II Greece was occupied by Nazi Germany while Turkey was pro-Axis. The Greeks suffered terrible privations in the last years of the war. In 1954 Greece, Turkey and Yugoslavia formed a new Balkan Pact for mutual defence against the Soviet Union.

The Cyprus crisis

Main article: Cyprus dispute

In the 1950s the Cyprus issue flared up again, with the Greek Cypriots under Archbishop Makarios demanding union with Greece, and the EOKA group launching a paramilitary movement against the British on the island. At first the Greek government gave no support to the movement, but by 1954 Greek public sympathy for the Cypriots was so great that Prime Minister Alexander Papagos took the Cyprus issue to the United Nations.

Turkish nationalist sentiment became inflamed at the idea that Cyprus would be ceded to Greece, and the Greek communities of Istanbul and Izmir were targeted in the Istanbul Pogrom of 1955. In response Greece withdrew from all co-operation with Turkey and the Balkan Pact collapsed.

In 1960 a compromise solution to the Cyprus issue was agreed on. Cyprus became independent, with a constitution guaranteeing a Greek president and a Turkish vice-president. Both Greek and Turkish troops were stationed on the island to protect the respective communities. Greek Prime Minister Constantine Caramanlis was the main architect of this plan, which led to an immediate improvement of relations with Turkey, particularly once Menderes was removed from power in Turkey.

Both Greek and Turkish Cypriots were displaced during the period of inter-communal strife in 1963 and 1964. A Liaison Committee was established, comprising of representatives of the three guarantor powers (Britain, Turkey and Greece) and the two communities. This established that in February 1964 1,600 Greek Cypriots had been displaced because of the fighting. The UN Secretary General estimated that eventually 25,000 Turkish Cypriots moved from their homes to nearby villages/towns as a result of the Christmas Massacre executed by Greek Cypriots, in which the number of Turkish Cypriots killed remains unknown.

On 30 December, Makarios declared his proposal of Constitutional amendment which included 13 articles. However, Turkey restated that it was against this and threatened war if Cyprus tried to achieve unity with Greece. In August Turkish aircraft bombed Greek troops that surrounded a Turkish village (Erenkoy) and war seemed imminent. Once again the Greek minority in Turkey suffered from the crisis, many Greeks fled the country, and there were even threats to expel the Ecumenical Patriarch. Eventually intervention by the United Nations led to another compromise settlement.

The Cyprus dispute fatally weakened the liberal Greek government of George Papandreou, and in April 1967 there was a military coup in Greece. Under the clumsy diplomacy of the military regime, there were periodic crises with Turkey. Turkey rightly suspected that the Greek regime was planning a pro-unification coup in Cyprus.

The Closure of the Halki Theological School

In 1971 the Turkish government closed down the Halki Theological School which was founded in the 19th century on the grounds of the Patriarchal Monastery of the Holy Trinity, which had occupied the site for over a thousand years. The Seminary, located on the island of Halki was closed in conformity with a Turkish law that forbids private universities, despite Article 24 of the Turkish Constitution which guarantees religious freedom and education. In 1998, Halki's board of trustees were ordered to disband until international pressure persuaded the Turkish authorities to reverse their decision. In October 1998, both houses of the US Congress passed resolutions that supported the reopening of Halki. In addition, human rights groups including Helsinki Watch support the reopening of Halki.

The 1974 crisis and after

On 15 July 1974 the Greek military regime staged a coup against Makarios, led by the Greek officers leading the National Guard. An ex-EOKA man, Nicos Sampson (who took part in the fights against the Turkish Cypriots, during the Christmas of 1963 mentioned above) was appointed president. Makarios escaped to Britain. On 20 July Turkey, using the guaranteur status arising from the trilateral agreements, invaded without any resistance from the British forces in the island, occupying the northern 40% and expelling the Greek population. Once again war between Greece and Turkey seemed imminent. War was averted when Sampson's coup collapsed a few days later and Makarios returned to power, and the Greek military regime also fell from power on 24 July, but the damage to Turkish-Greek relations was done, and the occupation of northern Cyprus by Turkish troops would be a sticking point in Greco-Turkish relations for decades to come.

An additional complication arose in Greek-Turkish relations during the 1970s: the discovery of oil in the Aegean Sea. The Balkan Wars of 1913 had given Greece all the Aegean islands except Imbros and Tenedos), some of them only a few kilometres (barely more than 3 nautical miles) off the Turkish coast. According to the Turkish government, the Greek-Turkish maritime border had never been properly defined, and Turkey now claimed that the seabed resources connected to the Anatolian plate, namely oil, should be shared by the two countries, while the Greeks insisted that 12 nautical miles (22 km), as defined by the International Law of the Sea, is their sovereign right, which could also be lawfully executed by Turkey on the same grounds.

In recent years relations between Greece and Turkey have considerably improved, although various territorial issues have never been fully resolved and remain constant sources of potential conflict. An attempt at rapprochement, dubbed the Davos process, was made in 1988. The retirement of the staunch socialist Greek prime minister Andreas Papandreou helped this improvement. His son, foreign minister George Papandreou, made considerable progress in improving relations. He found a willing partner in Ismail Cem and later in Turkish prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Timeline

July 20 1974 to July 24 1974: Cyprus Crisis (as mentioned above)
1974 to today: Turkey executes in daily military flights using the international air corridors provided by international agreements, which includes the Greek Athens FIR and Greek airspace including overflights of Greek islands adjacent to Turkish mainland. The response of the Greek airforce is to identify intercept and pursue those fighters aggressively till they exit proclaimed Greek airspace.

Athens has by ICAO rules legally extended its airspace, which runs 10 nautical miles (16 kilometers) from its coastline, which includes Turkish mainland. While Ankara insists on 6 nautical miles (10 kilometers), the same distance as for territorial waters, to prevent further aggressions.

25 December 1995 to 31 January 1996: Imia (in Greek) / Kardak (in Turkish) crisis brought the two countries to the brink of war.
2004 Turkey reconfirmed a "casus belli" if Greece extends its territorial waters to 12nm as the recent international treaty and international law allows. Turkey extended its territorial waters only in the Black Sea and the eastern mediterranean to 12nm. Greece hasn't yet extended its territorial waters in the Aegean, which by some would inflame the Greko-Turkish problems in the Aegean (such as continental shelf and airspace disputes).
12 April 2005 Greece and Turkey have agreed to establish direct communications between two air bases in an effort to defuse tension over mutual allegations of air space violations over the Aegean Sea.

External links

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