At the same time due to the favorable political conditions that have been created and the domestic support that the policy of rapprochement met in both sides of the Aegean, Greek-Turkish economic relations expanded widely and in an unprecedented scale.
The importance of FDI for the Greek-Turkish rapprochement process is twofold.
49) The process of societal rapprochement particularly intensified when two earthquakes struck both Turkey and Greece in 1999.
57) Despite the fact that there is no updated data to demonstrate that there is a consistently declining pattern on the mutual sense of hostility in two countries, this particular data indicates that when there is political will on an intergovernmental level for rapprochement and a conducive role of mass media, the public in both countries sooner or later will follow.
All in all, the win-win situation that the process of Greek-Turkish rapprochement developed was noticeable from its early stages.
Despite the Greek-Cypriot rejection of the proposed plan and its acceptance by the Turkish-Cypriots the eventual accession of the Republic of Cyprus in the EU did not harm Greek-Turkish relations and especially the rapprochement process.
It is within this context that we can understand why Greek-Turkish rapprochement process did not end after the Greek-Cypriot rejection of the Annan plan.
The Role of the EU towards Greek-Turkish Rapprochement
The role of the EU in all the rapprochement developments in Greek-Turkish relations since 1999 has been of paramount importance.
It is very true that the EU has been, at least at the beginning a great promoter of Greek-Turkish rapprochement.
