US: Turkey’s NATO points with Sweden, Finland shall be fastened

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken mentioned Friday he’s confident Turkey’s objections to Finland and Sweden becoming a member of NATO will be overcome swiftly, possibly in time for a summit of alliance leaders on the end of next month.

At a news conference in Washington with visiting Finnish Overseas Minister Pekka Haavisto, Blinken mentioned the U.S. has no cause to imagine Turkey’s concerns can't be addressed. His feedback came after Turkey’s prime diplomat mentioned Finland and Sweden must take “concrete steps” before Ankara could support their membership.

“America totally supports Finland and Sweden becoming a member of the alliance and I proceed to be assured that both will quickly be NATO members,” Blinken said. “We sit up for being able to name Finland and Sweden our allies.”

Haavisto mentioned his country and Sweden had held “good negotiations” with the Turks over their considerations in current days and said these discussions would proceed with a watch toward resolving them before the NATO summit in Madrid on the finish of June.

“We agreed to proceed to these talks,” Haavisto mentioned. “We expect that these problems can be solved that Turkey has been raising. We hope that some results may very well be achieved before the NATO summit.”

Sweden and Finland submitted their written purposes to affix NATO final week. The transfer represents one of many biggest geopolitical ramifications of Russia’s battle in Ukraine and will rewrite Europe’s safety map.

The countries’ membership bids require support from all 30 current NATO countries, however Turkey, which commands the second-largest navy in the alliance, is objecting to them. It has cited alleged help for Kurdish militants whom Turkey considers terrorists and restrictions on weapons sales to Turkey.

Earlier Friday, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu stated the Finnish and Swedish negotiating delegations had been given paperwork detailing Turkey’s issues, like data on terror teams, throughout their visit to Turkey this week. He stated Ankara is awaiting particular solutions.

Cavusoglu mentioned “an strategy of ‘we’ll convince Turkey in time anyway, we're associates and allies’ would not be right.” He insisted that “these countries must take concrete steps.”

He added that “we understand Finland and Sweden’s safety considerations however ... everybody also wants to know Turkey’s legitimate safety issues.”

Turkey this week listed 5 “concrete assurances” it was demanding from Sweden, including what it stated was “termination of political support for terrorism,” an “elimination of the supply of terrorism financing,” and the “cessation of arms assist” to the banned PKK and a Syrian Kurdish militia group affiliated with it.

The demands also called for the lifting of arms sanctions in opposition to Turkey and global cooperation in opposition to terrorism.

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

“There is no doubt that we do want the accession of Sweden and Finland to the NATO alliance to be able to make it stronger,” Polish International Minister Zbigniew Rau stated.

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

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