Finland and Sweden do not want to live up to the hopes that Turkey’s NATO node will open soon. Instead, be prepared to be in NATO for a long time. This is what the leading professor at the Turkish Foreign Policy Institute is saying Hüseyin Bağci.
He says in a video interview with that a solution is unlikely to come at the NATO summit in late June in Madrid.
– Turkey will prolong the process, but in the end NATO will expand, Bağci assures and thinks that a second summit may be needed.
According to Bağc, Finland’s and Sweden’s membership in NATO would not be confirmed this year.
The professor emphasizes that Turkey does not in itself oppose Finland’s and Sweden’s NATO membership, but it now needs answers from its countries to its terrorist concerns.
President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has accused Finland and Sweden of protecting terrorists. This was despite the fact that Sweden put the Kurdish armed resistance on the PKK’s terrorist list as early as the 1980s, the first country after Turkey. In Finland, the PKK, which is listed by the EU as a terrorist organization, is banned.
The director of the Turkish Foreign Policy Institute considers Sweden to be a bigger problem than Finland in the Kurdish question. He specifically mentions a Member of Parliament with a Kurdish background in the Swedish Parliament. Turkey has a Kurdish background Amineh Kakabavehia terrorist.
In an interview with , the professor ponders that he may not be elected in the Swedish autumn parliamentary elections.
Erdoğan seeks political victory
Hüseyin Bağci, director of the Turkish Foreign Policy Institute, estimates that the road to NATO in Finland and Sweden would be paved if the President of Turkey were able to provide assurances that Turkey would respond to terrorist concerns.
The reason is also domestic. Elections are coming up in Turkey next year.
– Domestic satisfaction is important. Erdoğan should be able to sell it to the Turkish people. Look, I got what I wanted in the negotiations.
The President of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has demanded that Finland, among other things, extradite those he considers to be terrorists. This week, he called for intervention in “state television” as a condition of accepting NATO membership.
Although according to ‘s expert assessments, the Turkish Foreign Policy Institute is considered to be relatively independent of the administration, Bağci, who heads the institute, seems to consider Erdogan’s concerns about Finland and Sweden to be justified.
– No one can deny the fact that they are in Finland and Sweden, especially in Sweden. No one can claim to me that there are no PKK supporters in NGOs. I read about these things and I know, Professor Bağci says.
He is a professor in the Department of International Relations at the Middle East Technical University in Ankara. Bağci does not hide his connections with current elements of Turkish foreign policy. Among other things, the professor’s lectures have included the current Ambassador of Turkey to Sweden. Bağci describes Turkey’s newly appointed Finnish ambassador as a friend.
“Be patient”
The professor’s assessments of Turkey’s ideas are also of interest to Finland’s foreign policy leadership. Bağci says that he is coming to Finland next week and will meet with both the President of the Republic and the Foreign Minister. He has a clear message for them.
– Be patient.
The professor states that the NATO membership process in Finland and Sweden has become “very difficult”. Now is the time of close diplomacy, to which Turkey has brought the bazaar-like Spices.
– This is high-level politics and diplomacy. Trading in the Middle Eastern model, Bağci laughs.
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