Media report: Greece and Turkey renew battle over Turkaegean trademark and tourists

Military tensions have eased but Greece and Turkey are fighting it out over tourists and Turkey using a Turkaegean campaign to try to lure visitors to spots along the Aegean that once were Greek.

The European Union – which Turkey has fruitlessly been trying to join since 2005 – approved the term that essentially allows Turkey to make claims on the Aegean through tourism although Turkey covets the return of Greek islands.

Now Greece is fighting back after a new Turkaegean campaign included a full-page ad in The New York Times and a video clip showing young people enjoying sandy beaches and olive groves on Turkey’s Aegean coast on Bloomberg TV.

The popular French daily Le Monde also had a full-page ad for the campaign as Turkey tries to catch up to Greece becoming one of the world’s hot spots in 2022 and again this year.

After a backlash over being caught unaware that Turkey was registering the trademark with the EU, Greece’s New Democracy government hired the Washington, D.C. litigation firm Steptoe & Johnson, said Kathimerini.

The American company will prepare a report backing Greece’s claims at a cost of about $70,000 in a bid to stop Turkey from using the term in the United States and EU, while Turkey is preparing counterarguments.

A decision likely won’t come for t least two years though said Al-Monitor and Greece is facing another ironic complication – so much tourism construction, much of it unlawful, has been allowed that infrastructure on islands can’t keep up and a survey is showing visitors will start shunning Greece in summer.

Too late, Greece in 2022 objected to the Turkaegean trademark after Turkey had already registered it with the EU Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) and the World International Property Organization (WIPO).

“This is not an innocent advert but another argument being used to ultimately question our sovereignty over Greek islands in the Aegean and our rights in maritime economic zones,” George Katrougalos, the former foreign minister from Greece’s major opposition SYIZA said – with elections coming May 21.

“The term implies, as a corollary of  (Turkey’s) propaganda, that all, or most, of the Aegean, is Turkish,” he said, without mentioning it was his party that came away with the name of the Greek province Macedonia to a newly-renamed North Macedonia.

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Most embarrassingly for the government, EUIPO let Turkey have the trademark for the Aegean where many Greek islands are among the most favored attractions, Turkey’s campaign confusing the identity.

Under the decision, Turkey can use Turkaegean in all its advertising campaigns, including for TV, radio, online, tourism accommodation and car rentals, and dozens of other listed services until July 16, 2031, in the EU.

Greece’s government is frantically trying to reverse that – while bringing more attention to the term at the same time – and complaining that tourists are mixed up over what is Greek or Turkish.

European Commission Vice President Margaritis Schinas, from Greece’s ruling New Democracy, sent a sharply worded letter to Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton demanding a review of the decision, the news site said.

“EUIPO’s internal controls and procedures have not proved sufficient to identify and notify a case with obvious and potentially serious implications for the external relations of the EU, the sovereign rights of Greece, and the protection of consumers and the EU tourism sector,” he said.

The European Commission replied that Greece had missed the deadline for objecting to the EUIPO but could make an invalidity request to annul it, which is the new strategy.

“We have had a small victory as the EUIPO accepted our request for an invalidity petition, and the litigation process has started,” Greek Infrastructure and Development Minister Adonis Georgiadis said.

That’s so much inside baseball and politicking that tourists don’t care about and until there’s a decision they will continue to see ads and videos about Turkaegean plastered all over major media while Greece can only wince.

“There is no decision that prevents us from using it. Moreover, it is pure paranoia on the part of Athens. Anyone who looks at the map knows that there are two coasts on the Aegean, and one belongs to Turkey,” a Turkish official note named told the site, confident Turkey would win.

“We will do this campaign even more strongly next year and show that the Aegean is not a region of Greece but also a region of Turkey, a tourism brand,” Turkish Deputy Tourism Minister Nadir Alpaslan – who resigned from his post in March – had said earlier.

Read more at thenationalherald.com

RELATED TOPICS: Greece, Greek tourism news, Tourism in Greece, Greek islands, Hotels in Greece, Travel to Greece, Greek destinations, Greek travel market, Greek tourism statistics, Greek tourism report

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