Baku-APA. Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu visited Athens on Friday, heading a major delegation of Turkish cabinet ministers for two-day talks with Greece's political leadership, APA reports quoting Xinhua.
The visit comes amid tensions in bilateral ties in recent months over the exploration and exploitation of energy resources in the Mediterranean Sea and a police ban on demonstrations.
The convening of the 3rd Greece-Turkey High-Level Cooperation Council in Athens, chaired by Davutoglu and Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras on Saturday, is part of a series of measures launched four years ago to improve relations between the two sides.
On Friday, following meetings with Samaras and Greek President Karolos Papoulias, the two premiers are scheduled to address the Greece-Turkey Business Forum.
Davutoglu's visit, however, is clouded by the escalating verbal war between the two neighbor countries over the presence of oil and gas research vessels off the coasts of the ethnically-divided Cyprus.
Turkey and the Turkish Cypriot side objected right from the start to Cyprus' decision to issue licenses for the exploration of energy deposits.
Ankara's decision to launch a similar search with the vessel Barbaros within Cyprus Exclusive Economic Zone this autumn was met with strong reactions by both the Greek Cypriot side and Athens which blasted the move as violation of international law.
Cyprus has remained divided since 1974, when Turkish troops occupied the northern part of the island after a coup by Greek army junta officers.
The Cypriot government run exclusively by Greek Cypriots is internationally recognized and represents the whole of the island in the European Union.
Meanwhile, Greek police have taken strict security measures, as the visit comes a day before the sixth anniversary of the killing of Greek teen Alexandros Grigoropoulos by police fire which had caused nationwide riots.
The anniversary has been marred by violence in recent years. This year, tension has increased since one of the victim's friends, jailed bank robbery Nikos Romanos, is on hunger strike over the past three weeks over a furlough to study at university.
Romanos was arrested last year for a bank robbery and was suspected of being a member of a local urban guerilla group. He has been convicted to 16 years of imprisonment.
Demonstrations have been banned from Friday until Saturday afternoon and about 7,000 police officers have been deployed across the Greek capital.
Concern for possible violent acts has increased after a series of minor attacks with fire bombs and rock pelting against two bank branches, a police precinct and a court complex in various Athens districts on Thursday night and early hours of Friday, which caused no injuries.
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