US: Turkey’s NATO issues with Sweden, Finland can be mounted

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated Friday he’s assured Turkey’s objections to Finland and Sweden joining NATO will be overcome swiftly, possibly in time for a summit of alliance leaders at the finish of subsequent month.

At a news conference in Washington with visiting Finnish Overseas Minister Pekka Haavisto, Blinken mentioned the U.S. has no cause to believe Turkey’s issues cannot be addressed. His feedback got here after Turkey’s top diplomat stated Finland and Sweden must take “concrete steps” before Ankara may support their membership.

“The USA absolutely supports Finland and Sweden becoming a member of the alliance and I continue to be confident that each will quickly be NATO members,” Blinken said. “We stay up for with the ability to call Finland and Sweden our allies.”

Haavisto said his country and Sweden had held “good negotiations” with the Turks over their concerns in current days and said those discussions would proceed with an eye toward resolving them earlier than the NATO summit in Madrid at the end of June.

“We agreed to proceed to those talks,” Haavisto stated. “We expect that these issues may be solved that Turkey has been elevating. We hope that some outcomes could be achieved before the NATO summit.”

Sweden and Finland submitted their written applications to hitch NATO last week. The move represents one of many largest geopolitical ramifications of Russia’s war in Ukraine and could rewrite Europe’s security map.

The nations’ membership bids require help from all 30 present NATO international locations, but Turkey, which instructions the second-largest navy within the alliance, is objecting to them. It has cited alleged assist for Kurdish militants whom Turkey considers terrorists and restrictions on weapons sales to Turkey.

Earlier Friday, Turkish Overseas Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said the Finnish and Swedish negotiating delegations had been given documents detailing Turkey’s issues, like data on terror groups, throughout their visit to Turkey this week. He said Ankara is awaiting specific answers.

Cavusoglu said “an strategy of ‘we’ll persuade Turkey in time anyway, we are associates and allies’ wouldn't be correct.” He insisted that “these international locations have to take concrete steps.”

He added that “we perceive Finland and Sweden’s security concerns but ... everybody also needs to know Turkey’s reliable safety considerations.”

Turkey this week listed five “concrete assurances” it was demanding from Sweden, including what it said was “termination of political assist for terrorism,” an “elimination of the supply of terrorism financing,” and the “cessation of arms support” to the banned PKK and a Syrian Kurdish militia group affiliated with it.

The calls for additionally called for the lifting of arms sanctions towards Turkey and international cooperation in opposition to terrorism.

Cavusoglu’s comments came at a news convention with the visiting overseas ministers of NATO allies Poland and Romania, both of whom expressed strong assist for Finland and Sweden’s bids.

“There isn't any doubt that we do need the accession of Sweden and Finland to the NATO alliance with a view to make it stronger,” Polish International Minister Zbigniew Rau said.

Romanian Overseas Minister Bogdan Aurescu, agreed, saying their membership would “consolidate the collective defense and our security.”

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