Turkey Clashes With EU, Israel Over Cyprus and Gaza

Turkey's frictions with Europe flared over Cyprus on June 8. The Cypriot government, which holds the rotating EU Council presidency, accused Turkish forces of interfering with military aircraft carrying the defence ministers of Greece, the Netherlands and France to an EU meeting on the island, saying two Turkish F-16s tracked at least one plane while controllers at the unrecognised Ercan airport jammed radio communications. Nicosia said it would denounce the incident to EU foreign-policy chief Kaja Kallas and the European Council. Ankara rejected the account: Turkey's Disinformation Combat Center said the jets had responded to aircraft violating the airspace of the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and remained within it, while a Turkish Cypriot controllers' union called reports of harassment "politically motivated." The episode came hours before Cyprus and France were due to sign a defence accord stationing French forces on the island -- a deal the Turkish Cypriot side has declared "null and void" -- and against a backdrop of Turkish plans to legislate an exclusive economic zone reaching 200 nautical miles into waters also claimed by Cyprus and Greece.

A separate row sharpened with Israel. Turkish Interior Minister Mustafa Çiftci denounced Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz, reaffirming Ankara's support for the Palestinian cause and for Jerusalem's status, after Katz attacked President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Çiftci over the minister's expressed wish to see Jerusalem liberated. The exchange marked a further escalation in the war of words between the two governments over the Gaza conflict.

Even as it traded blows on two fronts, Ankara cast itself as a regional stabiliser. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, speaking after the 10th trilateral meeting of the foreign ministers of Türkiye, Azerbaijan and Georgia in Istanbul, said peace in the Russia-Ukraine war was essential to regional stability and warned that Black Sea maritime security was steadily deteriorating as the conflict widened. He pointed to deepening three-way cooperation, including joint energy infrastructure and the Middle Corridor trade route linking the Caspian to Europe.