Tibetan-Indonesian-Style Tectonic Evolution of Tethyan Orogenic Belts In the Eastern Mediterranean Region

The late Mesozoic-Cenozoic evolution of the Eastern Mediterranean region was controlled by a series of collisions between Gondwana-derived continental blocks and Eurasia as the intervening basins closed. Rifting of these 'ribbon continents' from Gondwana was mostly driven by slab-pull generated far-field stresses. Continued subduction of the Paleo-Tethyan ocean floor northward beneath Eurasia was responsible for these continental rifting events in its trailing edge and backarc extension in the leading edge of Eurasia in the upper plate. Intraoceanic subduction within Neo-Tethyan seaways and slab rollback processes produced extended incipient arc-forearc crust nested within the older Tethyan lithosphere. Fragments of this protoarc-forearc lithosphere constitute the Jurassic-Cretaceous SSZ ophiolites along the suture zones. Emplacement of SSZ ophiolites was facilitated by passive margin-trench collisions, which led into and was followed by partial subduction of continental edges, their HP metamorphism, and continental collisions. Discrete collisional events in the Paleocene-Eocene between different continental fragments caused the formation of thick orogenic crust, high plateaus and heterogeneous mantle, and resulted in slab breakoffs that led to the onset of tectonic extension and shoshonitic magmatism. The collision of Arabia with Eurasia at 13 Ma facilitated the SW tectonic escape of Anatolia and caused intense deformation accommodated by crustal shortening and strike-slip fault systems in a zone of ~1000 km extending from the Bitlis-Zagros suture zone in the south to the Greater Caucasus in the north, reminiscent of the Tibetan Plateau. The Anatolian plate has been undergoing internal deformation through a combination of strike-slip and normal faulting during its escape to the SW. Subduction rollback along the Hellenic Trench has been the driving force for this SW motion of Anatolia and the late Cenozoic extensional tectonics affecting the Aegean province, analogous to the lithospheric extrusion from SE Tibet into Indochina due to trench rollback along the Pacific-Indonesia subduction systems.