Greek Foreign Minister Giorgos Gerapetritis has announced that Athens and Tripoli have agreed to open formal technical discussions on delimiting their Exclusive Economic Zone and continental shelf boundaries, marking the most significant diplomatic breakthrough between the two countries in years.

The reaction of Turkey after the rather surprising mid-Week announcement by the Greek government on maritime spatial planning came as a surprise to Athens. Both the neighbor’s reference to Greece‘s unilateral actions and the announcement of the submission of the corresponding Turkish map to international organizations such as UNESCO and the UN, had already been discussed behind the closed doors of the Kysea, which met yesterday under the prime minister at the Maximos Mansion.

The meeting of Kyriakos Mitsotakis with Tayyip Erdogan in New York confirmed the mutual will and effort to move the relations of the two countries into a new phase without the tension of the past.