Impact of the energy issue on Turkey’s Easten Mediterranean policy

Energy and its security is one of the most important issues in making of a foreign policy. Seeking of alternative energy resources and having their own share, stirred the Eastern Mediterranean with the discoveries of hydrocarbon reserves. The fact that Turkey is highly dependent on energy resources, that its consumption rates are increasing year by year, and that it aims to be the energy hub that transfers energy to Europe, has also led Turkey to want to be part of the energy equation that is emerging in the Eastern Mediterranean. Although the parties to this equation excluded Turkey. Turkey took some actions in the region, but it is not enough plus after Covid-19 Turkey stopped its actions, and recently it shifted its interest mainly to the Black Sea in terms of energy. In this context, this thesis aims to answer the question of what Turkey should do in the Eastern Mediterranean. And concluded that she needed to take actions to better her relations with the regional actorsstates and non-regional actors that had a part in the equation. Turn the current situation of exclusion otherwise and use the disagreements between those actors to her advantage. Also, continue her activities of drilling and research in the Eastern Mediterranean that she initiated before, but shift to the Black Sea.