Erdogan links Sweden Nato bid to return of ‘terrorists’
President Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday Sweden should not expect Turkey to approve its Nato bid without returning “terrorists”, and Swedish and Finnish delegations should not come to Turkey to convince it to back their membership in the alliance.
Ankara says Sweden and Finland harbour people it says are linked to groups it deems terrorists, namely the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group and followers of Fethullah Gulen, whom Ankara accuses of orchestrating a 2016 coup attempt. “We have such a sensitivity as protecting our borders from attacks by terrorists organisations,” Erdogan told lawmakers from his ruling AK
Party in parliament.
Erdogan said Nato allies had never supported Turkey in its fight against Kurdish militant groups, including the Syrian Kurdish YPG, which Ankara also views as a terrorist group closely tied to the PKK.
“Nato expansion is only meaningful for us in proportion to the respect that will be shown to our sensitivities,” he said.
Turkish state broadcaster
TRT Haber said on Monday
Sweden and Finland had not granted approval for the repatriation of 33 people that Turkey requested.
“So you won’t give us back terrorists but you ask us for Nato membership? Nato is an entity for security, an organisation for security. Therefore, we cannot say ‘yes’ to this security organisation being deprived of security,” Erdogan said.
Erdogan also accused Nato allies of supporting terrorists, citing their arms deliveries for the YPG as well as other Western countries. In 2019, Ankara received little international backing for its plans to build a safe zone in northern Syria, including settling 1 million Syrians in part of northeast Syria that Turkey and its Syrian rebel allies seized from the YPG.
Erdogan has also said Turkey would oppose the Nato bids from those who imposed sanctions on Ankara. Sweden and Finland had banned arms exports to Turkey after its Syria incursion against the YPG in 2019.
Erdogan said Nato allies had never supported Turkey in its fight against Kurdish militant groups, including the Syrian Kurdish YPG, which Ankara also views as a terrorist group closely tied to the PKK.