EU SANCTIONS ON TURKEY

Ankara has for years challenged and has attempted to encroach on Athens’ search-and-rescue area on the ground but never in such a formal and sweeping manner.

“We shall continue with a plan that has been studied very well and is linked to the upgrading of Greece’s international role in the broader region and to our decisiveness about exploiting our energy resources,” PM Alexis Tsipras said.

'What I mentioned in my remarks was that the draft conclusions as regards Turkey that we had before us at the start of the meeting were unsatisfactory and that we could not approve them [which would be tantamount to a veto],” Cyprus' foreign minister said.