Dispute in Aegean Sea: Ownership of Islets and Rocks

Abstract

The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), called also “Law of the Sea Treaty” or “Law of the Sea Convention” is the final agreement on the Sea, Maritime and Continental Shelf matters. The Maritime Law changed for the third time at the Conference convened in New York on 1982, after 9 years of long discussions. Greece signed the UNCLOS and Turkey together with USA and some other countries did not.

Greece, right after the official release of convention results and verifying it officially, ignited a dispute in Aegean Sea to expand its control over marine areas adjacent to its coastlines based on the continental shelf rights of the islands, claiming ownership on the islets where their ownership not ceded to Greece by any international treaty. The unilaterally and intentionally declaration ownerships of islets and rocks by Greece based on rules, regulations and laws issued by the Government of Greece, which does not originate from any international treaty or agreement, by the time officially led to a “fait accomplish” ownership of the islets and rocks by Greece, which according to UNCLOS, would lead the Aegean Sea to be a Greek Lake, stretching from Turkish coast line to the shores of the Greece in Aegean Sea. Most of the islets and the rocks, being the core of the decades long dispute between Turkey and Greece, bear no economic life or value and do not sustain any human or animal habitation. Most of them are even not large enough to be marked on a map, except portolans.