Turkey monitoring Greek Cypriot oil and gas exploration

Turkey is closely monitoring the exploration of oil and gas fields being carried out by the Greek Cypriot administration, the Turkish General Staff announced Monday.

In a statement, Turkey’s military leaders said security forces had been watching the Bahamas-flagged SAIPEM-10000 drillship as it explores for oil and gas off the southern coast of Cyprus.

Earlier, Turkey warned the administration against unilateral moves to extract natural gas and oil without considering Turkish Cypriot claims to the reserves.

In a statement released Saturday, the Foreign Ministry said: “Turkey follows with concern the Greek Cypriot administration’s continuing unilateral research activities of hydrocarbon resources in its so called exclusive economic zone without taking into account the Turkish Cypriots’ detailed and concrete cooperation proposals for a fair sharing.”

In late 2011, Noble Energy found an estimated 142 to 227 billion cubic meters of gas off the south-eastern coast. After discovering such significant reserves, the Greek Cypriot administration declared it would cooperate with Israel on drilling.

The island of Cyprus has been divided since a Greek Cypriot coup was followed by a Turkish peace mission to aid Turkish Cypriots in 1974.