Greece Won’t Let British Ship Refuel During NATO Exercise

Greece has refused refueling facilities to a British merchant ship taking part in NATO exercises, a virtually unprecedented snub of one Atlantic Alliance state by another, NATO sources said today.

They said the ship Green Rover had asked at the beginning of the week to refuel at Souda Bay, Crete, where Greek and U.S. forces have major facilities.

Greece refused the request and the ship, taking part in the NATO exercise Distant Hammer, had to go to the Turkish port of Izmir, the sources said.

Greece’s Socialist government stayed out of the exercise because of differences with NATO member Turkey concerning sovereignty over parts of the Aegean Sea.

“The British consider this unprecedented,” one source said. However, he noted that Greece last year had refused stopovers to U.S. planes on their way to take part in another NATO exercise that Athens was boycotting.

The sources said the allied naval command in Naples was inquiring into the circumstances of the refusal.

Greek officials have said in the past that when Greece does not take part in a NATO exercise, no part of its land, air or sea space may be used.

However, a NATO source said Athens had not as yet communicated to its allies any policy of refusing to refuel ships, a service that alliance members offer one another on a routine basis.