Turkey condemns Greece for opening fire on unarmed ship

By Fatih Hafiz Mehmet, Levent Kisi, Durmus Genc and Sabri Kesen

ANKARA

Turkish Foreign Ministry strongly condemned Greece for an incident involving a Greek coast guard boat opening fire on a Turkish commercial ship on Monday.

In a written statement, the ministry said the Turkish ship M/V ACT carrying dry cargo was sailing from Iskenderun port in southern Turkey to Izmit port in northwestern Turkey when it came under attack by a Greek coast guard boat.

"We strongly condemn the unmeasured act of Greek authorities in this disgusting incident," the statement said.

There can be no justification for opening fire on an unarmed ship sailing from one Turkish port to another, it added.

The statement said the only solace is that no one got killed or wounded in the incident.

The commercial ship that had come under attack later docked at Marmaris port in southwestern Turkey after it was escorted by three Turkish coastal guard boats and an assault boat.

After the ship docked, ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party Mugla lawmaker Nihat Ozturk inspected the ship riddled with bullet marks.

Speaking to reporters, Ozturk said the ship carrying 13 crew had more than 20 bullet marks.

"These bullets were randomly shot. If one of these bullets had hit one of our friends then perhaps we would be talking about other things now," he added.