Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said today, Wednesday, after a meeting with the head of the Libyan Presidency Council, Mohamed Al-Manfi, that the two countries have agreed to hold talks on demarcating their maritime zones in the Mediterranean.
In a statement after the meeting, Mitsotakis said that they "agreed to resume talks between Greece and Libya immediately on the demarcation of the maritime zones."
He added that Greece is seeking to reset relations with Libya, which were strained due to the Tripoli government signing a maritime border agreement in 2019 with Turkey.
The head of the Libyan Presidential Council, Mohamed Al-Manfi, arrived on Tuesday, the Greek capital, Athens, on an official visit at the official invitation of the country's president.
The spokeswoman for the Presidency Council, Najwa Wahiba, said late Tuesday, through a tweet on her Twitter page, that the visit "will begin with a meeting with Mrs. President of the Republic Ekaterini Saklaropoulou and Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, on Wednesday to discuss a number of files and issues of common interest."
Wahiba did not reveal the duration of the visit, but it is expected that it will take two days, according to a source from the media office of the Presidential Council, who preferred not to publish his name.
The exiled's visit to Greece comes after he received an official invitation from Skylaropoulou, on Sunday, according to Wahiba.
On April 6, the Greek Prime Minister arrived in the capital, Tripoli, on an official visit, during which he met the exiled and the head of the Libyan government, Abd al-Hamid al-Dabaiba.
Ankara affirms that the necessary measures will be taken against any unilateral move that does not take into account Turkish rights and interests.
On Monday, Turkey and Libya concluded 5 agreements in various fields, at a ceremony attended by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the head of the Libyan National Unity Government, Abdul Hamid al-Dabaiba.
And the French newspaper (Le Monde) last week said that Mitsotakis called on the new Libyan national unity government, during his meeting with its president, Abdelhamid Dabaiba, to end the 2019 maritime agreement signed with Ankara, and said, "Let those who tried to question our relations in the past remain in the background."
The newspaper stated that the Europeans support Athens on the issue of maritime borders, and stated Dabaiba's response to Mitsotakis by stressing "the importance of any agreement that could provide appropriate solutions, while preserving the rights of Libya, Greece and Turkey."
Admiral Jihad Yayji, the former Chief of Staff of the Turkish Navy, confirmed that the Turkish-Libyan maritime border demarcation agreement was a strategic choice by the politicians of the two countries, and that this agreement gave Libya 39 thousand kilometers of water.
He added: If Libya had signed the agreement with Greece, it would not have obtained this large water distance, stressing in the same context that Greece wants to plunder the water areas of Libya, Egypt and the Arab countries.
The Turkish general clarified that the Libyan opposition stood on the importance of the Turkish-Libyan border demarcation agreement, and that the future Libyan governments could not give up these important national gains.
The Turkish expert stressed that the Greek foreign minister stated that his country's policy in the eastern Mediterranean region is based on two main objectives, which are to cancel the agreement between Turkey and Libya, and to withdraw Turkish forces and Turkish workers from Libya.