39782 - The Balkans and the EEZ

N. Lygeros
Translated from the Greek by Athina Kehagias

One of the enormous differences between the Balkan countries and us, is our EEZ, which constitutes the second largest EEZ in the Mediterranean. Serbia obtains no EEZ, Skopje has no EEZ and Bosnia Herzegovina has a very small one. In actual fact, the issue of the EEZ concerns Croatia due to its islands, and Albania and Montenegro which of course obtain much smaller EEZs than ours. And instead of us utilizing upon this huge advantage in order to make the difference in the region, and to upgrade our position at a geo-economic level, not only we are delaying all the processes at the level of proclamation, demarcation and negotiations, but we are setting bureaucratic obstacles our selves. Consequently, Greece doesn’t appear as a big player in the Balkan region. Quite the contrary, we are in a rush to sign up the peculiar Article 13 of the Pre-Agreement with Skopje, which gives them access to the Greek EEZ even prior to its institutional existence. And the question is simple: what is the reason for this institutional delay and of the non-utilization of the Greek EEZ data? Are there still some in charge of matters who haven’t comprehended its value and its significance?