Cyprus President and Greek Premier share call to coordinate

President Nicos Anastasiades and the Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis shared a telephone conversation on Thursday to coordinate a series of separate contacts and deliberations the two leaders will hold with top EU officials.

According to deputy government spokesperson Panayiotis Sentonas, Anastasiades and Mitsotakis discussed ongoing developments, particularly Turkey’s illegal activities in the Cyprus EEZ and the broader Mediterranean region.

The two leaders agreed to remain in close contact and to coordinate in view of separate bipartite teleconferences they will each hold within the next 24 hours with the European Council President Charles Michel and EU High Representative Josep Borrell.

Anastasiades, along with Foreign Minister Nicos Christodoulides, is scheduled to hold a teleconference with Michel and Borrell on Friday.

On his part, Mitsotakis’ teleconference is scheduled for Thursday afternoon. He is expected to discuss the EU's long term budget and the effectiveness of the EU’s Operation Irini that aims to enforce the UN arms embargo on Libya. The two officials will also discuss Turkey’s activities in the region, according to government spokesman Stelios Petsas.

On Wednesday, Christodoulides held a telephone conversation with his Greek counterpart Nikos Dendias.

According to the Cyprus News Agency, Christodoulides and Dendias discussed, in the framework of the two countries` coordination, the next steps at the regional and European level with a view to address Turkey’s behaviour in the broader region, in view of the EU Foreign Ministers Council that will convene via a video conference on June 15.

Moreover, Dendias briefed Christodoulides about his talks on Tuesday in Athens with his Italian counterpart Luigi De Mao, with whom he signed an agreement on the delimitation of the maritime zones between Greece and Italy.