A presidential decree to commence the drawing of straight baselines in the Ionian Sea, off the western Greek mainland, came into effect on Monday with the publication in the government gazette, the next step in the looming expansion of territorial waters (mainland, islands) by the country to 12 nautical miles in the specific maritime region.
A relevant post on the Greek foreign ministry's webpage notes that:
"...the closing of bays and drawing of straight baselines in the maritime area of the Ionian and the Ionian islands up to Cape Tainaro in the Peloponnese entered into force today. The Presidential Decree was issued pursuant to the law ratifying the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). It is a necessary step in the process for extending the country’s territorial waters in the above-mentioned area, an action which is, on the basis of the Convention, our country’s inalienable right.
"The Presidential Decree highlights that Greece reserves the right – as deriving from the Convention on the Law of the Sea, which reflects international customary law – to exercise its respective rights in other areas of its territory."
The latter is a reference to the Aegean Sea, where neighboring Turkey's national assembly passed a jingoistic resolution in 1996 allowing the government to wage war in case Greece's exercises its right, under UNCLOS, to extend territorial waters. Subsequent Turkish governments failed to delete the illegal and provocative resolution, whereas the current Erdogan regime has engaged in the most belligerent actions in decades by the official Turkish state.
The development also comes after last week's publication, by the UN, of a Greece-Egypt agreement delimitating a large portion of maritime Exclusive Economic Zones between the two countries in the east Mediterranean.
Greece and Albania have also agreed to refer to the matter of delimitation of an EEZ in the Ionian Sea to the International Court at The Hague.
