- Title: US's Pompeo to Turkey: "illegal drilling is unacceptable"
- Date: 5th October 2019
- Summary: ATHENS, GREECE (OCTOBER 5, 2019) (AGENCY POOL) (SOUNDBITE) (English) US SECRETARY OF STATE, MIKE POMPEO, SAYING: "So it's too early to know if we made any progress in Stockholm with respect to North Korea. I'm hopeful that we will. We came with a set of ideas. We hope that the North Koreans came with a good spirit and a willingness to try to move forward to implement what President Trump and Chairman Kim agreed to back in Singapore. Our team is on the ground, it's a broad team with a full range of expertise to deal with the broad range of issues related to the every element of that agreement, there were four pillars that the two leaders agreed to and we were very hopeful that we will make some progress. We're mindful this will be the first time we've had a chance to have a discussion in quite some time." WHITE FLASH (SOUNDBITE) (English) US SECRETARY OF STATE, MIKE POMPEO, SAYING: "Real simple with respect to Ukraine. State Department and you can see this I think from what everybody's seen Ambassador Volker said on Thursday... State Department was very focused; at the direction of the president we were very focused on creating space that we could ultimately deliver a good relationship with this new government."
- Embargoed: 19th October 2019 12:39
- Keywords: Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias Greece US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo Dilovasi Port Ukraine Turkey ship politics North Korea
- Location: ATHENS, GREECE / DILOVASI, TURKEY
- City: ATHENS, GREECE / DILOVASI, TURKEY
- Country: Greece
- Topics: Diplomacy/Foreign Policy,Government/Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA005AZTKJEV
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: The United States wants to ensure that rules govern exploration of energy sources in the Mediterranean Sea, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said during a visit to Athens on Saturday (October 5), adding that Turkey's illegal drilling in the region is unacceptable.
"We want to make sure that rules govern international exploration in the Mediterranean Sea's energy resources and that no country can hold Europe hostage," Pompeo said.
"We have told the Turks that illegal drilling is unacceptable and we'll continue to take diplomatic actions to make sure that we do, as we do always, ensure that lawful activity takes place," Pompeo said.
Earlier, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis urged the United States to use its influence to defuse tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean, where Cyprus and Turkey are locked in a dispute over offshore rights.
During the news conference Pompeo also said the U.S. State Department had issued an initial response to a Congressional request for documents as part of an impeachment investigation of President Donald Trump.
Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives are examining whether there are grounds to impeach Republican President Donald Trump based on a whistleblower's account that said he asked Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in a July 25 phone call to help investigate Democratic political rival Joe Biden.
He also touched on U.S. -North Korean talks taking place in Sweden, adding that it was too early to know if there had been any progress.
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