Greek-Turkish row

Press, 9 December 1983, Page 6

Greek-Turkish row

NZPA-Reuter Brussels

A row between Greece and Turkey over the Aegean Sea and Cyprus erupted at a meeting of Western Alliance Defence Ministers yesterday, delaying the discussion of arms control, delegates said. The Greek Prime Minister, Dr Andreas Papandreou, at the meeting in his role as Defence Minister, sparked the confrontation when he attacked N.A.T.O.’s

decision to exclude the Greek island of Lemnos, near the Turkish coast, from a military exercise last September.

The Turkish Defence Minister, Mr Haluk Bayulken, hit back, saying the island was demilitarised by international treaty, and the two men argued for almost an hour, the delegates said. Dr Papandreou lambasted Turkey for supporting last month’s unilateral declaration of independence by

leaders of Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus and also criticised the deployment by N.A.T.O. of new American medium-range missiles in western Europe. The 55-minute GreekTurkish exchange occupied the whole of a “restricted” session in which Ministers had hoped to discuss the prospects for arms control after last month's Soviet walkout from the Geneva talks with the United States on medium-range missiles.