Five prominent Greek Americans have called on the US government to take action and not allow Turkey to escalate tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean, with a full-page sponsored editorial in Tuesday's issue of the New York Times.
The op-ed published under the title “Turkey and Greece can and must live together,” is signed by John A. Catsimatidis, Andrew Liveris, Dennis Mehiel, Michael Psaros and George P. Stamas.
The text which is framed by a photo of Hagia Sophia, states, among other things, that "Turkey's aggressive behaviour negatively affects and undermines the positive relations and cross-border exchanges between the neighbourly peoples of Turkey and Greece, which have enormous potential."
At the same time, there is a need for "the United States to support Greece's commitment to international law and peaceful negotiations, “while abstaining from threats of violence, military activity and belligerent rhetoric.”
The authors mention a number of Turkish initiatives to demonstrate that Ankara has become a “destabilizing factor” in the broader area including the conversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque, unlawful activity in the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean and military involvement in Syria, Libya, Iraq and Nagorno-Karabakh.
“Turkey and Greece can and must live together. Their peoples deserve a peaceful future of economic and cultural exchanges and cooperation as citizens of modern western democracies,” the authors say.
“That, after all, will be the benefit of their neighbors and the wider region,” they say.
The New York Times
The New York Times (NYT or NY Times) is an American daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide influence and readership
