Till today in 1996 the Imia Crisis was completed.
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Imia are some rocky islets east of the Aegean Sea that were ceded by Italy to Greece in 1947 with the Treaty of Paris
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On Christmas Day 1995 the Turkish merchant ship FIGEN AKAT runs aground in shallow waters near eastern Imia
probably by accident and sends out an SOS....
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the Greek coast guard rushes to help but the Turkish captain refuses, claiming that he is in Turkish territorial waters
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the next day the Kalymnos Port Authority informs the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs informs the Turks,
that if the Turkish ship is not assisted by a tugboat, there is a risk of an accident
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with a lot after 3 days,
2 Greek tugs detach the Turkish ship and drive it to a Turkish port
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on the same day in an air battle in Greek airspace a Turkish aircraft crashes near Lesbos, but the Turkish pilot is rescued by the Greeks
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on the following 29 December 1995 the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs issues a verbal note to the Greek Foreign Ministry saying
that
the rocky islets are registered in the land register of Turkey
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after about a dozen days the Greek Foreign Ministry rejects the interlocution
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neither the Greek state nor the Greek public opinion is concerned with them...
has other...
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Andreas is in Onassis with severe pneumonia and there is a massacre to see who will get the ring
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is a period when Akis Tsochatzopoulos is the absolute favourite and Kostas Simitis the underdog.
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Finally on 15 January 1996 Andreas MESA of the Onassis Hospital resigns
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PASOK and the whole country are on fire, front and back
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finally,
on the 19th of the month, Kostas Simitis is elected Prime Minister
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does not have time to pass a week and the mayor of Kalymnos along with a policeman, a priest and a couple of others,
they go to one of the 2 rocky islets and raise the Greek flag
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the next day some Turkish journalists arrive at Imia in a helicopter (!!!!) and take down the Greek flag,
put the Turkish language in its place, film the whole thing and play it on Turkish channels where they become popular heroes.
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now the hard times begin....
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on 28 January a navy patrol boat takes down the Turkish flag and raises the Greek flag
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and while there are Turkish ships in the surrounding area at night a group of Greek frogmen landed in the large Imia
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on the 29th of the following month Simitis in his programmatic statements in parliament sends a message to Turkey that Greece will react dynamically to any provocation
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Turkey's Prime Minister Tansu Chiller asks to discuss the issue,
while at the same time Turkish warships enter Greek territorial waters and approach Imia
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the Greek Foreign Ministry makes representations to Europe, NATO and the USA
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on the 30th of the following month Simitis calls US President Clinton and tells him that the Greeks do not want tension but we will not allow our borders to be disputed.
We are ready to withdraw the frogmen, but not the flag.
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was the time when Clinton was in deep trouble with Monica Lewinsky and didn't bother much with other issues.
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meanwhile the Turkish warships are increasing in the area which makes almost the entire Greek fleet to leave the naval base and fill the Aegean Sea
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meanwhile the Turkish foreign minister says that apart from Imia there are other Greek islands with unclear legal status...
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things are very tough
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on the 31st of the month, at 12 midnight, a meeting is held in the Prime Minister's office.
They are all there except for Foreign Minister Theodoros Pangalos who is on a panel of Hatzinikolaos....
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waiting waiting waiting waiting waiting..
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At some point Hatzinikolaou got sleepy, finished the show and finally the minister was released and went to the meeting
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in the midst of the tense meeting and as the night progresses, information arrives
that
Turkish commandos land in the small town of Imia.
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At four thirty in the morning a naval helicopter takes off from the frigate NAVARINO to confirm the information
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the weather conditions are very bad
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after a while the helicopter confirms by radio that it saw about ten men on the rocky island
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but when it returns, it reports a malfunction and disappears from the radar
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were later recovered dead
the
Lieutenant Christodoulos Karathanasis,
Lieutenant Panagiotis Vlachakos
and Chief Petty Officer Hector Yalopsos
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6 am US Secretary of State pulls the ear of both (Greece-Turkey)
and gives an explicit order
You've played enough.
from now on, no ships, no soldiers, no flags.
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by noon on the 31st of January all the ships, all the frogmen and all the flags from Imia had disappeared
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since then the Greeks believe that there has never been an issue
and the Turks
that there are grey areas in the Aegean Sea
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On February 1, 1996, a few hours after the Imia crisis,
Prime Minister Costas Simitis
thanked the US for its initiative and assistance
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the clamour that fell on Simitis for this move is beyond description
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is just the facts without any personal judgment...
just one comment and anyone who understands.... understood
politics is the art of the possible....
