Editorial: The need for one policy, one voice in dealing with Turkey

Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias' visit to Ankara for scheduled talks with his Turkish counterpart, Mevlut Cavusoglu, was obviously designed to expand and bolster channels of communications with Turkey.

On the eve of the visit Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan invited Dendias for talks at his huge presidential complex in Ankara.

Greek diplomatic sources say that the Dendias-Erdogan discussion went smoothly and without any of the Turkish president's recent public outbursts. Indeed, he is said to have adopted a cordial tone in talking about a bilateral dialogue and seemed to leave open some prospect of a normalisation of relations through talks without third party mediators.

There was, according to the same sources, a similarly positive climate during the Dendias-Cavusoglu talks that followed.

The agenda included an array of low politics and pending issues - which had been raised from time to time in the past but were put on the back burner due to unfavourable conditions - regarding the interconnection, communications, and trade relations between the two countries.

The Greek side hoped that working together on such issues could launch a new period of normalisation in bilateral relations that could lead to a resolution of differences in a future phase.

All that changed when, during joint remarks following his meeting with Dendias, Cavusoglu called members of the Muslim minority in Thrace Turkish citizens.

Nikos Dendias responded immediately by citing the provisions of the Lausanne Treaty that specifically describes the minority in Thrace as Muslim. He underlined that Turkey is a signatory [along with Greece and several other countries] to the treaty.

With his repeated interruptions Mr. Cavusoglu allowed Dendias to...