Turkish Preaident Erdogan says no to new NATO nations following their recent applications to join. Turkiye will say “no” to entry of Finland and Sweden into NATO, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Thursday, as senior representatives of the two countries are set to visit Turkiye for talks in the coming days, Anadolu News Agency reports.
The Turkish leader reiterated Ankara’s security concerns amid Helsinki and Stockholm’s NATO bids, saying the Nordic countries are hosting members of militant groups, such as YPG and PKK and the Fetullah Terrorist Organisation (FETO). “We told them, we said that NATO is a security organisation, we cannot accept the existence of terrorist organisations in such an organisation,”
Turkey, a longstanding NATO member, has voiced objections to Finland and Sweden’s membership bids, criticising the countries for tolerating and even supporting militant or terror groups, including they claim, the YPG and PKK. Over the last five years, Turkey says both Helsinki and Stockholm have failed to agree to Ankara’s requests for the extradition of dozens of terrorists, including members of the PKK and FETO, the group behind the 2016 defeated coup in Turkiye.
Senior representatives of Finland and Sweden are set to visit Turkiye in the coming days to hold official talks in Ankara to discuss their accession processes.