Rear Admiral Cihat Yayci is said to be the architect of Turkey"s aggressive behavior in the Mediterranean JEDDAH: The head of the Turkish Navy was demoted because he fell out with the country’s powerful defense minister, analysts told Arab News on Saturday. Rear Admiral Cihat Yayci, architect of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s policy on Libya and maritime borders in the Mediterranean, was suspended from active duty and reassigned to the military general staff in a surprise presidential announcement on Friday night. Yayci has argued that Turkey should be aggressive in claiming sovereignty of small islands in the Aegean, as the successor to the Ottoman Empire. As recently as December, Erdogan publicly thanked him for his work on Libya policy and the Turkish-Libyan maritime border deal signed in November. However, as Arab News reported last week, Turkey and Israel are in negotiations over a Mediterranean agreement similar to the Libya deal. Yayci is actively promoting such an agreement, which is thought to have angered Defense Minister Hulusi Akar. “His controversial suggestions for Turkish maritime policy infuriated Akar,” a military analyst in Ankara told Arab News. “He tried hard to convince the Foreign Ministry of the need for an assertive military policy in the eastern Mediterranean. Finally, he succeeded in promoting the Libya deal. “But the final straw was his insistence on pushing for negotiations between Israel and Ankara over maritime borders. The foreign ministry was against such a deal.”