Erdogan aftershocks in the North: The foreign ministers of Finland and Sweden, whose applications to NATO are on the agenda, wanted to meet with Çavuşoğlu.
After AKP leader and President Tayyip Erdogan signaled that Turkey was distancing itself from Finland and Sweden, which are preparing to apply for NATO membership, into a military alliance, the two countries’ foreign ministers said they wanted to meet with their Turkish counterparts.
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The foreign ministers of NATO countries will meet this weekend (May 14-15) at a meeting in the German capital Berlin. The meeting will also be attended by the foreign ministers of Finland and Sweden, whose NATO membership is on the agenda.
Swedish Foreign Minister Ann Linde told the French news agency AFP: “We will have the opportunity (in Berlin) to discuss Sweden’s potential application for NATO membership. The Turkish government did not give us such a message directly.”
Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto, who held a press conference in the capital Helsinki on Friday, said she hoped to meet with Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu during meetings over the weekend “to continue to discuss the issue.”
When a country decides to apply to become a member of NATO, the military alliance requires a unanimous vote of 30 member states to make a formal invitation. If the unanimity is achieved and an official invitation is sent, accession negotiations will begin between NATO and the applicant country.
What did Erdogan say?
After Friday prayers, Erdogan said, “I am following the developments regarding Sweden and Finland. But we don’t think positively. Because the previous administrations made a mistake about NATO regarding Greece. And you know the attitude of Greece towards Turkey with NATO behind its back. As Turkey, we do not want to commit a second mistake in this regard. Moreover, the Scandinavian countries are unfortunately like a guesthouse of terrorist organizations. The PKK and DHKP-C are nestled in the Netherlands and Sweden. I go even further, they are also included in the parliaments there. It is not possible for us to look at it positively.”
