Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Sunday said Greece wants to be a part of the United Nations-sponsored talks scheduled in January on the Libya conflict, reported News 24.
“We do not want a source of instability in our neighborhood. Therefore we want a say in developments in Libya,” the prime minister told To Vima weekly in an interview. “We want to be part of the solution in Libya, as it concerns us too.”
The U.N. has said it is going to conduct an international conference next month in Berlin to seek a political solution to Libya’s ongoing conflict. Libya is going through a war-like situation as eastern commander Khalifa Haftar’s forces have been fighting forces loyal to the UN-backed Libya government to take over Tripoli since April.
“I have requested, and will do so again with greater insistence, that we participate in the Berlin process,” Mitsotakis said.
Libya has become a diplomatic concern for both Turkey and Greece as the two countries have turned foe over Mediterranean maritime rights and the competing camps in the North African country’s conflict.
In November, Turkey signed a maritime deal with the UN-recognised government in Tripoli. The deal lays claim to much of the Mediterranean for energy exploration, conflicting with rival claims by Greece and Cyprus.
Turkey has also offered military aid to Tripoli, which is battling the forces of military strongman Haftar for control of the capital.
Greece rejected the maritime deal calling it baseless, arguing that Turkey and Libya share no maritime border.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Mitsotakis said Libya is Greece’s natural maritime neighbor and not Turkey’s.
He suggested that Athens and Ankara should head to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague to settle their dispute about maritime zones in the eastern Mediterranean, reported Reuters.
