ATHENS: Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said on Thursday Greece would not tolerate any challenge to its territorial integrity, days after Turkish and Greek coast guard vessels collided close to disputed islets in the Aegean Sea.
“Our message, now, tomorrow and always, is clear... Greece will not allow, accept or tolerate any challenge to its territorial integrity and its sovereign rights.”
“Greece is not a country which plays games,” Tsipras told an audience at the cοuntry’s shipping ministry.
The collision involving the two vessels occurred on Monday evening off Imia, known as Kardak in Turkish. Each side blamed the other for the incident.
Turkey and Greece, NATO allies, have been at odds over a host of issues from ethnically split Cyprus to sovereignty over airspace and overflights.
They came to the brink of war in 1996 in a sovereignty dispute over the islets, but tensions have eased since.
Noting that Greece’s eastern border is also that of the European Union, Tsipras said: “Challenges and aggressive rhetoric against the sovereign rights of an EU member state are against the EU in its entirety.”
Tensions between the two countries have been on the rise since a Greek court blocked the extradition of eight Turkish soldiers whom Ankara accuses of involvement in a failed coup against President Tayyip Erdogan in 2016.
Greece says it won’t tolerate challenge to its rights after Turkish collision
Greece says it won’t tolerate challenge to its rights after Turkish collision
Nigeria police charge driver in fatal Joshua crash
- Adeniyi Mobolaji Kayode charged with reckless and dangerous driving causing death
- British boxer's two friends Latif Ayodele and Sina Ghami were killed in the crash
LAGOS: Nigerian police on Friday charged the driver of a car carrying British boxer Anthony Joshua that was involved in a fatal crash with “reckless” and “dangerous driving causing death.”
Adeniyi Mobolaji Kayode, 46, was also charged with driving without a valid “driver’s license” and “driving without due care and attention, causing bodily harm and damage to property,” Oluseyi Babaseyi, a spokesman for the police in Ogun state, told AFP.
He was granted a five million naira bail ($3,500) but will remain in detention until he meets bail conditions, Babaseyi said.
Kayode was driving the boxer and two of his friends, Latif Ayodele and Sina Ghami, on a busy highway linking Lagos and Ibadan in southwest Nigeria when the Lexus SUV in which they were traveling rammed into a stationary truck on Monday.
Nigerian police and state officials said that Ayodele and Ghami died at the scene, while Joshua and the driver sustained minor injuries.
The Traffic Compliance and Enforcement Agency (TRACE) in Ogun state, where the accident occurred, told AFP earlier in the week that its preliminary investigations showed that the vehicle was moving at an excessive speed and had burst a tire before the crash.
Kayode is due to appear in court on January 20.
