Russian President Vladimir Putin would be the winner in the event Greece-Turkey relations escalated, US Ambassador in Athens Geoffrey R. Pyatt told Greece’s MEGA TV in an interview.
“If there were to be any sort of escalation, the only winner is our shared adversaries. The winner is Vladimir Putin,” the US diplomat said.
Referring to the recent border escalation of Greek-Turkish relations, Pyatt commented: “You can count on the US to be a strong NATO ally. We stand by our relations with Greece.”
“Greek borders cannot be changed. Greek sovereignty is indisputable. The US has made it clear that provocations such as the ones that happened last February and March when the Turkish government was encouraging migrants to travel to the land border often misinformed.”
“Many of these migrants were victims as they were told that the borders of Europe were open and that’s why they came to Evros,” he added.
The US diplomat also referred to a deal signed earlier this year between Turkey and Libya to demarcate maritime zones, which ignored the existence of the island of Crete. The US ambassador said Washington’s standpoint is that islands have the same rights as any continental territory in terms of offshore developments.
“We also believe that issues of maritime limitation like this cannot be addressed through unilateral actions as Turkey took last year. These issues can only be addressed through dialogue," he concluded.