ArmInfo. Armenian Foreign Minister Zohrab Mnatsakanyan held a telephone conversation with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cyprus Nikos Khristodulidis. As the Armenian Foreign Ministry press service told ArmInfo, the interlocutors discussed a number of issues, both bilateral and the Armenia-Cyprus-Greece format, exchanged views on preparatory work for the Armenia-Cyprus-Greece summit to be held in Yerevan.
In the context of the development of the situation in the Eastern Mediterranean, the Armenian Foreign Minister expressed support and solidarity to the Cyprus side. The parties emphasized the importance of international cooperation in ensuring and strengthening regional security and stability.
It should be noted that Turkey sent troops to Libya to support the side of the civil war, with which it drew up memoranda on the division of maritime borders. According to these documents, Turkey and Libya declare that a significant part of the exclusive economic zone of Greece belongs to Turkey. Based on this memorandum, Turkey declared its rights to the Eastern Mediterranean and sent a drilling vessel to the southern shelf of Cyprus. As noted, the right to drill in this area has already been granted by Cyprus to the foreign oil and gas companies Eni and Total.
Earlier, the EU has already imposed sanctions on Turkey for exploration in disputed waters off the coast of Cyprus, which is a member of the community. Ankara last year entered into an agreement on the division of the sea space in the Eastern Mediterranean with the Libyan Government of National Accord (PNC), led by Faiz Sarraj. Then Ankara stepped up assistance to its supporting forces, announcing the transfer of its military to Libya.
A number of states claim to develop hydrocarbon deposits in the Eastern Mediterranean, including Turkey, Cyprus, Greece and Egypt, which, in particular, undermines attempts to reach an agreement on a political settlement in Libya. So, Athens, responding to Ankara's attempts to agree on the division of the sea space with the PNS, became close to Sarraj's main adversary – Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, commander of the Libyan National Army.
This problem was previously commented by TASS by the Permanent Representative of Russia to the EU Vladimir Chizhov, who worked for a long time in Greece and Cyprus, and in 1997-2000 he held the post of special representative of the Russian Federation on the Cyprus settlement issue. According to him, the problem of field development in the region is exacerbated not only by Turkey's occupation of Northern Cyprus, but also by the lack of a clear understanding of the issue of the continental shelf of the islands in international maritime law. This creates a legal vacuum in which each side chooses its own interpretation, the Russian diplomat noted.