Eastern Mediterranean

Ersin Tatar, the prime minister of Turkish Cyprus announced on Jan. 18 that he will run for presidential race that will take place in April 2020.

He announced his candidacy after the party assembly meeting of the National Unity Party (UBP), of which he is the leader.

Seven countries on Thursday adopted the institutional framework for creating the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum that will be based in Cairo.

Turkey's industrial output in November 2019 was higher than the EU's average in the same month.

While the EU average was negative 1.3 percent, the index dropped 1.5 percent in the eurozone, and rose 5.1 percent in Turkey, according to the data from Eurostat and TÜİK.

After talks with Libyan military commander Khalifa Haftar on Friday, Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias said Greece expected Germany to safeguard European positions at Sunday's summit on the Libya crisis in Berlin - which include that the Turkey-Libya maritime boundaries agreement is invalid.

The Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum, in which Turkey and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) have been left out, is an unrealistic formation, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said on Jan. 16.

"If the purpose of this forum was really cooperation, of course, Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots would be invited to the forum as well," spokesman Hami Aksoy said in a statement.

By George Gilson

In a resounding response to German Chancellor Angela Merkel's decision to bar Greece from the 19 January Libya peace conference, Libya National Army leader General Khalifa Haftar arrived in Athens for talks with Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias and PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis just two days before the conference.

The European Union will be prepared in case of any migration wave from Libya amid crisis in the region, a European Union official said on Jan. 15.

Turkey's involvement in Libya's domestic affairs is a "serious source of concern" for the countries in the region, Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias said on Wednesday, during a visit to Morocco.

Turkey's ban on online encyclopaedia Wikipedia is set to be lifted after the official publication on Wednesday of a Constitutional Court ruling that the more than two-year block was a violation of freedom of expression.

About 1,000 migrants have been returned to Libya in the past two weeks, according to a statement issued by The UN Migration Agency (IOM), quoted by the DPA.