Turkey’s Erdogan discusses NATO application with Swedish PM: Report
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accepted a request by Sweden’s new prime minister to visit Turkey to discuss Ankara’s objections to Stockholm and Helsinki’s NATO membership, local media reported on Friday.
Earlier this year, Sweden and Finland broke their long-standing policy of non-alignment after Russia invaded Ukraine and sought to join the US-led military alliance.
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The move has received strong support from the majority of NATO member states, but Erdogan has stalled the process amid accusations that the Nordic neighbors are a haven for Kurdish militants hostile to Ankara.
“Sweden’s new prime minister asked for an appointment. I told our friends to book a meeting.’… We will discuss these issues with him in our country, Erdogan said on private NTV television in his plane returning from Azerbaijan.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said Thursday he was ready to head to Ankara to urge Turkey to support his country’s bid to join the alliance.
On his first trip abroad as Sweden’s new foreign minister, Tobias Billstrom told reporters in Helsinki that the proposed meeting between Erdogan and Kristersson was “very positive” news.
“We believe that close dialogue and close negotiations with all three parties … is the way forward,” he said.
Billstrom added that “negotiations on the implementation of the agreement would have broad scope” and that Sweden expected Turkey to ratify the applications “in due course”.
Kristersson said he was aiming to show the Turkish leader that Sweden and Finland are “really doing what we promised” to fulfill the deal with Ankara to clear its way to NATO.
Erdogan said Ankara’s position remained unchanged and called on Sweden and Finland to release “these terrorists” wanted by Turkish authorities.
“Unless they are sent back to us, things will not work at the parliamentary stage,” he threatened.
Erdogan has accused both countries of harboring Kurdish militants, with particular emphasis on the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), and of promoting “terrorism”.
According to a Western diplomat interviewed by AFP, there is a “reasonable possibility” that an agreement will be reached with Ankara before Turkey’s elections scheduled for June.
Paul Levin, director of Stockholm University’s Institute for Turkish Studies, told AFP he was “cautiously optimistic” about the possibility of a breakthrough.
“I think things could move. Although the rhetoric has been quite tough so far, especially from the Turkish side, it was tough even before the Madrid summit,” Levin said, noting that the two sides managed to reach an agreement that allowed the official invitation to move forward.
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