ATHENS – The Greek foreign ministry underlined in a statement on Thursday that Turkey is in no position to lecture others on human rights.

“Those who were condemned by the international community for instrumentalising human suffering to serve political expediencies have obviously no right to school anyone in human rights,” the statement said.

The first hesitant steps that had just been initiated in Greek-Turkish dialogue “did not stop Turkey from exhibiting its unprecedented cynicism and from sparking new tension between the EU and Turkey,” the ministry added.

“Greece remains open to dialogue, but it is not prepared to help legitimise Turkey’s persistent violations of international legality,” the statement concluded.