NICOSIA - Turkey has issued permits to a Turkish company to launch oil exploration in areas spanning from Rhodes to the south west of Cyprus, it has emerged from maps published by the official gazette of the Turkish government.
The maps show that the permits stretch as far as he Greek island of Rhodes as well as plots 1, 4, 5, 6 and 7 delineated by the Republic of Cyprus in the eastern Mediteranean.
The five permits were issued to the Turkish Petroleum company TPAO and cover areas offshore from Adana, Attalia, Antioch and Mougla, all outside Turkey's terrotorial waters.
The reaction from the Greek Foreign Ministry was immediate, with its spokesman saying that the publication in the official gazette on Saturday of a series of decisions taken by the Turkish cabinet in March 2012 granting oil exploration permits in areas south of Rhodes and Kastelorizo contravenes the Law of the Sea. He reminded Turkey that the under international conventions on the Law of the Sea, areas covered in these decisions are part of Greece's continental shelf. He said the Greek Foreign Ministr was taking all necessary steps to defend Greece's soverign rights.
On Thursday, the same Turkish company began exploratory drilling for oil and gas in occupied north Cyprus prompting an immediate protest by the govenrment which slammed Ankara for stoking tensions and undermining peace efforts.
The U.S. firm Noble Energy announced last December the discovery of an estimated 5-8 trillion cubic feet (140-230 billion cubic meters) of gas inside one of 13 blocks that make up Cyprus' exclusive economic zone. Officials said that is enough to meet the island's energy needs for many decades.
The Cypriot deposit sits close to a massive Israeli field and the two countries are currently discussing ways of how to extract and process the gas for domestic use and possible export. Cyprus launched a second licensing round for more offshore exploratory drilling earlier this year.
Tensions were raised last year when Ankara sent a warship-escorted research vessel to look for fuel off the island's southern coast. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan also warned that his country would "retaliate even more strongly" to any further mineral exploration around the island.
The Cypriot government says any fuel search is its sovereign right accorded to it under international law and has denounced what it calls Turkey's "gunboat diplomacy." It also said gas finds could be an incentive to peace that would allow both Turkish Cypriots and Turkey to share in the wealth.