ANDRAVIDA, Greece (AP) — Greece has vowed to expand military cooperation with traditional NATO allies as well as Middle Eastern powers in a race to modernize its armed forces and face its militarily assertive neighbor Turkey. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis visited an air base in southern Greece to attend multinational military exercises joined by fighter jets from the United States, France, Israel, Spain and the United Arab Emirates. Greece spends more on defense than any other European Union country relative to the size of its economy. But it announced a major rearmament program last year following a naval standoff with Turkey over natural gas drilling rights in the eastern Mediterranean.
