A forum convening journalists and academics from Türkiye and Greece is aiming to contribute to the recent rapprochement between their countries on a more public level, according to one participant.
The Turkish-Greek Media and Academy Forum is convening a dozen experts and specialists in Istanbul this Thursday under the coordination of the Foundation for Türkiye Studies (TAV), the American College of Greece and the Institute of Global Affairs.
"The purpose is to help offset the negative rhetoric in the collective consciousness of both Türkiye and Greece, establish a more rational ground and create a positive agenda based on a win-win for both nations," associate professor Enes Bayraklı, the deputy general director of TAV, told Daily Sabah.
Bayraklı will be moderating the first panel of the event, which will focus on the role of the media in Turkish-Greek relations and include speeches by professor Enis Tulça (Galatasaray University), professor Konstantinos Filis (Director of Institute of Global Affairs), associate professor Panagiota Manoli (ELIAMEP) and associate professor Esra Özsüer (Istanbul University).
“Besides politicians, academicians and journalists have the most sway on forming public opinion and the fact that they are assembling to dissect these relations is really important in terms of producing long-term remedies,” Bayraklı said.
There has been a rapprochement in Turkish-Greek relations in recent months, encouraged by the goodwill and humanitarian assistance shown on both sides earlier this year when southern Türkiye was rocked by two deadly earthquakes and Greece suffered a tragic train incident.
Both sides have warned against steps and statements that could damage the current environment of trust as President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis pledged to maintain the positive atmosphere after holding two rare face-to-face meetings.
The sides have also revived their high-level strategic peace talks with an upcoming summit in Thessaloniki in December, which is expected to be an important leap in bilateral ties as Erdoğan will be making the trip over the Aegean Sea and meet Mitsotakis in person.
Relations between the neighbors have been strained for decades over several outstanding issues, including the delimitation of maritime zones, the arming of Aegean islands, which are demilitarized under treaty obligations, irregular migration, airspace and the ethnically split island of Cyprus among many others.
“These problems aren’t new and we know they won’t be resolved in a day,” Bayraklı said while acknowledging deep social, cultural and historic bonds between the neighbors.
“There is a possibility for a positive agenda. With this forum, we hope to contribute to that effort and maybe even produce concrete political items, suggestions and projects,” he said. “We hope to break shared prejudices and misconceptions in both peoples with forums like this.”
Bayraklı believes the tumultuous Turkish-Greek relations have at times been influenced by “third parties that sought to maneuver Athens by scratching its issues with Ankara,” but it must also be noted Türkiye has “managed this period with complete calm without causing any hot conflicts.”
The fact that Türkiye-Greece ties have been managed at their current state without any escalation in a climate of deepening crisis across the globe is a success in and of itself, Bayraklı noted.
“It has also demonstrated Ankara can navigate bilateral relations on a certain level and dodged any traps set out for it while remaining firm in protecting its rights,” he said.
The current state of affairs provides a window of opportunity for positive cooperation and mutual benefit, which Türkiye is eager to utilize and is echoed by Greece, Bayraklı added.
Pointing out a discrepancy in how much space the two countries occupy in one another’s agenda, Bayraklı argued Greece was “far more occupied with Türkiye than Türkiye is with Greece” since Türkiye “has a lot on its foreign policy plate, from Israel-Palestine conflict to Syrian crisis.”
“We believe this imbalance must be remedied as well and hope this forum will serve to that end,” he said.
