Information conveyed by authoritative news media, including Turkish state television, has revealed that Ankara is drafting legislation that will formalize its “Blue Homeland” doctrine, or at least come very close to doing so, and resolve the matter of Greece’s so-called “gray zones.” I fail to see how it expects to resolve the latter issue with a law, unless, of course, it wants to bring all these “gray zones” under Turkish control – something that would be an extreme provocation, demanding an immediate response from the Greek state.
Domestically legislating jurisdiction over a broad maritime zone could be legal under international law if the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean were open, oceanic-scale seas, where Turkey did not have the mainland or islands of any third country opposite its shores – in other words, if they were not semi-enclosed seas, which limits the exercise of maritime rights. Unfortunately for Turkey, however, it must deal with this exact problem, as the maritime areas it can lawfully claim are limited by the presence of other states in both the Aegean and the Eastern Mediterranean. What’s more, in order to legally acquire rights in these areas, Turkey must do so through agreements with the states concerned: in the Aegean, with Greece, which possesses an extensive coastline; and in the Eastern Mediterranean, with Greece, Cyprus, Egypt and Syria.
