ATHENS (Reuters) – Cyprus said on Monday it ‘strongly condemns’ what it said was an infringement of its sovereign rights by Turkey, after Ankara sent a drill ship off the island to explore for oil and gas.

“This planned second drilling … is an escalation by Turkey of its repeated violations of Cyprus’s sovereign rights based on the U.N. Law of the Sea and international law, and is a most serious violation of the sovereignty of the Republic of Cyprus,” Cyprus’s presidency in Nicosia said in a statement.

The drill ship, Yavuz, is the second Turkish-owned drill ship to dock close to Cyprus in the past two months. Another ship, the Fatih, has been off the western coast of Cyprus since early May.