AEGEAN SEA

Turkey has "neutralized" 18,502 members of the PKK terrorist organization since July 24, 2015, and 1,976 have been "neutralized" since the beginning of this year, the country's Defense Minister Hulusi Akar said on Sept. 17. 

He called on Greece to demilitarise the islands in the Aegean Sea

New environmental projects for Istanbul are crucial as 76 percent of the pollution load of the Marmara Sea comes from the metropolis, the head of a parliamentary research commission examining mucilage that invaded the sea early in the summer has said.

One hundred asylum seekers were held in the town of Çeşme in Turkey's Aegean province of Izmir, Turkish officials said on Aug. 9. 

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According to a statement from the Turkish Coast Guard Command, a sail boat was stopped off the coast of Alaçatı in Çeşme.

Turkey will deliver icons stolen from historical local churches to Istanbul's Fener Greek Patriarch Bartholomew, the government said on Aug. 9. 

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A thermal power plant and its surrounding town on the Aegean Sea were being evacuated on Aug. 4 as a deadly wildfire that has ravaged Turkey for the past week engulfed its outer edge.

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Turkey has taken all necessary precautions to prevent any loss of life at the scene of a fire near the plant, the country's communications director said early Thursday.

Two separate earthquakes struck off Turkey's southwestern coast early on Aug. 3, according to the country's disaster agency.

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The Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) said the first quake, with a magnitude of 4.3, was recorded off the coast of the town of Datça in Muğla province at 2 a.m. local time (0000GMT).

The Aegean Sea was rocked with a string of earthquakes early on Aug. 1.

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The first one was a magnitude 5.5 earthquake that occurred in the Aegean Sea, near the small Greek island of Nisyros, west of Rhodes.

The quake's epicenter was 41 kilometers southwest of Muğla's Datça, an isolated resort town located on Turkey's Aegean coasts.

The Greek islands in the southern Aegean Sea are already in the dark red zone at risk of contracting COVID-19.

Ardino Municipality, Kardzhali District, will apply to UNESCO for including the emblematic Devil's Bridge in the list of world cultural and natural heritage. The stone structure was built in the 14th century and was one of the main road connections of the Rhodope Mountains with the Aegean Sea.