ATHENS – The statements about Greece made by Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in his speech at the United Nations were “unacceptable and provocative”, the main opposition SYRIZA-Progressive Alliance party’s sector chief for foreign affairs, George Katrougalos, said on Wednesday in television interviews with Kontra channel and the state broadcaster ERT.

According to SYRIZA press release, Katrougalos said that all political forces in Greece stand united against this aggression and any threat to violate the sovereignty and sovereign rights of the country.

He also emphasised that Turkey must be “made to bear a cost for its aggressive behaviour” and that it was not enough for Greece’s partners to make “less or more positive statements”. For this reason, he added, SYRIZA-PA had asked Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to make use of the sanctions framework of 2019 and to not concede an upgrade of EU-Turkey Customs Union unconditionally but link this to an end of Turkish aggressiveness and a commitment to resolve any differences over maritime economic zones at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.

Katrougalos said the Turkish president was instrumentalising refugees and migrants and stressed that Turkey could not criticise Greece, given its own record of violating human rights and international law.

At the same time, he noted that defence of the Greek border and refuting Turkish propaganda must be combined with scrupulous respect for international law, while he accused the government of converting a Euro-Turkish issue into a Greek-Turkish issue and leaving Greece exposed, depriving it of the support it should have from its European partners.