Greece, Turkey to draft framework to reduce tension

The defense ministers of Greece and Turkey, Evangelos Apostolakis and Hulusi Akar, said on Wednesday after talks in Brussels that technical teams from both countries will be tasked with drafting a framework of confidence-building measures in a bid to reduce tensions in the Aegean.

The general framework will be based on the confidence-building measures agreed in 1988 by then Greek Foreign Minister Karolos Papoulias and Turkey's Mesut Yilmaz.

"We discussed bilateral issues and the implementation of the Papoulias-Yilmaz memorandum of 1988," Apostolakis said after his meeting with Akar at Wednesday's NATO ministerial summit.

He added that the technical teams will begin meetings imminently.

Apostolakis also met with North Macedonia's Defense Minister Radmila Sekerinska, who became the country's first official to attend a NATO summit as an observer.

Continue reading on: