The Athens Declaration said that Greece and Turkey should avoid tensions by following the path of good neighbourliness.
In Ankara this has been understood as follows, as everything seems to indicate: The Greeks will sit quietly and we will continue unabated with our revisionist doctrine and the preparation of our Armed Forces for operations in the Aegean.
In this context, the Aegean Army proceeded with a landing exercise in the area of Phocaea.
In a related post, the Turkish Ministry of Defence said: ""Joint Amphibious Training" was held with the participation of our units under the Amphibious Task Force Command and elements attached to the Aegean Army Command."
https://x.com/tcsavunma/status/1737473878899691588?s=20
At the same time, by issuing another illegal directive to airmen (NOTAM), Ankara is attempting to cut the Aegean in two by blockading five areas from north to south for almost a whole month, namely from December 22, 2023 to January 16, 2024 for Search and Rescue and Environmental Protection exercises.
Athens reacted by stating the obvious. That Ankara has no authority to issue NOTAMs within the Athens FIR, that parts of the areas that Turkey wants to block overlap Greek national airspace, that only Greece is responsible for Search and Rescue operations within the Athens FIR and that furthermore, Turkey, ignoring the CAA's coordination message, not only defies the safety of general air traffic within the Athens FIR but also causes disruption to civil aviation by requesting long-term airspace reservation and by blocking the most economical levels of flight, endangers the efficiency and regularity of international civil aviation traffic.
At the same time, Turkey issued a NOTAM informing about a Search and Rescue operation opposite Agathonisi, stating however that the search radius will be 6 nautical miles, which also binds space within the Athens FIR, making Greece to issue an anti-NOTAM pointing out the Turkish violation...
What the Greek Foreign Ministry says in relation to Search and Rescue
Search and rescue for air accidents is governed by Annex 12 of the 1944 Chicago Convention and the ICAO Rules and Recommendations. The Greek area of responsibility for search and rescue in cases of air accidents has been defined by a periodic air navigation agreement within the framework of an ICAO Conference in 1952 and coincides with the Athens FIR.
As far as search and rescue in cases of maritime accidents is concerned, Greece has been coordinating these operations within the Athens FIR since its creation in the 1950s. Greece's assumption of responsibilities for maritime search and rescue within the Athens FIR reflects the geographical reality in the region, given the scattered Greek islands in the Aegean Sea, which allow for the most immediate, rapid and effective, from an operational point of view, provision of services for the protection of human life at sea. Moreover, this is also in line with the relevant IMO and ICAO recommendations on the need for Search and Rescue areas, both for air and maritime accidents, to coincide with the boundaries of FIRs.
Greece declared in 1975 its area of responsibility for maritime search and rescue to the Intergovernmental Maritime Consultative Organisation (IMCO), the predecessor of the International Maritime Organisation (IMO). Furthermore, both at the time of signing and ratifying the Hamburg Convention of 1979, which regulates maritime search and rescue issues and was adopted within the IMO, Greece declared that its area of responsibility coincides with the Athens FIR, a statement which was included in the law by which the said International Convention was incorporated into the Greek legal order in 1989 (Law 1844/1989).
It is noted that the Hamburg Convention provides that the areas of responsibility of the Contracting Parties for the provision of search and rescue services in the event of maritime accidents shall be determined by agreement between the coastal States concerned. In this context, Greece has signed agreements on cooperation in maritime search and rescue matters with Italy (2000), Malta (2008) and Cyprus (2014), which explicitly state that the Greek area of responsibility coincides with the Athens FIR, while similar agreements are pending with other neighbouring states.
Nevertheless, in 1988, Turkey issued Regulation 1988/13559 (as amended by Regulation 2001/3275), by which it defined as its area of responsibility for the provision of search and rescue services, without specifying whether it concerns maritime or air accidents, an area which, in addition to the FIRs of Istanbul and Ankara, includes part of the Athens FIR up to about the middle of the Aegean Sea, trapping a large part of Greek territory within the Turkish search and rescue area. In October 2020, Turkey with its newest Regulation (3095/2020), which explicitly refers to search and rescue for accidents involving both maritime and air assets, extended its area of responsibility for search and rescue in the Mediterranean - within the Athens FIR - westwards to the 26th meridian, touching the external territorial waters of the eastern coast of Crete, occupying an even larger part of Greek territory. e.g. the islands of Kasos and Karpathos) and the Greek search and rescue area.
This Turkish action, i.e. the inclusion of Greek islands, Greek territorial waters and Greek airspace in the Turkish search and rescue area, clearly violates the sovereignty of Greece and the relevant international conventions.
The inclusion of part of the Athens FIR in the Turkish area of responsibility, apart from lacking operational effectiveness, violates Greek responsibilities assigned by ICAO.
It also contradicts the general international practice, as well as the recommendations of IMO and ICAO, contained in the International Aeronautical and Maritime Search and Rescue Manual (IAMSAR Manual), which advocate the adoption of identical areas for the provision of search and rescue services in maritime and air accidents. Similarly, Annex 12 to the Chicago Convention recommends that search and rescue areas should coincide with the boundaries of FIRs.
It is clear from the above that any Turkish objections in this regard serve specific political purposes that have nothing to do with humanitarian search and rescue operations. And the more recent (October 2020) expansion of the Turkish search and rescue area in the Eastern Mediterranean, so that it coincides with the boundaries of the new expansive Turkish narrative of the "Blue Homeland", demonstrates that Turkey is using search and rescue as another vehicle to promote its revisionist and expansionist ambitions in maritime zones beyond any concept of international law.
In any case, it is noted that in practice, Greece, through the competent Greek Joint Rescue Coordination Center (JRCC) in Piraeus, effectively coordinates all search and rescue operations, providing services to all ships and planes in distress within the Greek area of responsibility.
