The eastern Mediterranean, long a stage for quiet rivalries, grew restless again this weekend as Türkiye and Greece traded competing maritime notices over a planned undersea power cable, reported by Hurriyet Daily News.
At the heart of the quarrel is the Great Sea Interconnector, a project meant to link the electricity grids of Greece and Greek Cyprus. Over the weekend, Athens issued a long-awaited NAVTEX, a maritime safety notice, allowing the French-flagged vessel Abeille Marengo to resume seabed surveys. The green light came three months after the French investment company Meridiam became the project’s majority shareholder.
Ankara was quick to object. Türkiye says parts of the survey area lie within its continental shelf, whose outer limits it reported to the United Nations on March 18, 2020. In its view, any research in those waters needs Turkish permission, and that permission has not been given.
On Nov. 6, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said the vessel planned to carry out “unlawful” marine scientific research tied to cable-laying on Türkiye’s shelf. The ministry stressed that the consent process required under international maritime law was still unfinished for the part of the work falling inside that area. It added that Türkiye had canceled the navigational warnings issued by Greece and the Greek Cypriot administration, calling them unauthorized.
Türkiye has not been standing still itself. Earlier, it issued its own maritime notice for a project of its own: an undersea pipeline stretching from the southern province of Mersin to Turkish Cyprus.
Even so, the ministry’s tone mixed firmness with a note of calm. Ankara said it remains fully determined to protect its sovereign rights under international law, yet will keep favoring cooperation, dialogue and coordination in the region.
For now, the sea is crowded as much with paper warnings as with ships. Beneath the waves, a cable waits to be laid; above them, two neighbors still disagree on who holds the key.
