President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan Wednesday said Sweden should do more to assuage Türkiye’s concerns about terrorism before Ankara approves its NATO bid while speaking to reporters during an interview on his return from his visit to the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) and Azerbaijan.
Erdoğan said Türkiye cannot approve the rallies in the Nordic country by the terrorist group PKK. "We cannot have a positive approach (to Sweden’s NATO accession) under the current circumstances. NATO cannot force us to admit Sweden without acting against terrorism. Unless you resolve this issue, we cannot merrily approve Sweden’s membership in Vilnius," he said, referring to the upcoming NATO summit where Sweden hopes Türkiye will approve its membership bid.
"The NATO Summit will be held in Vilnius. Hopefully, unless something extraordinary happens, I will attend. Sweden’s expectations do not mean we will comply with these expectations. For us to comply with these expectations, first of all, Sweden must do its part," Erdoğan said.
Erdoğan reiterated that he met with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg in Istanbul in early June. "We told him this: If you expect us to respond to Sweden’s expectations, first of all, Sweden must erase what this terrorist group has done. While we were expressing these to Stoltenberg, at that time, unfortunately, terrorists were demonstrating in the streets again in Sweden," the president said. On the way to NATO membership, Erdoğan called Stockholm to step up the police force to prevent PKK terrorists from operating in Sweden. "What do the police forces do? The job of the police force is to stop them... There are already rights given to the police force in laws and constitutions. Use these rights. You will not use these rights; then you will tell us: ‘Come and take Sweden into NATO.’ "Where is NATO’s counterterrorism leg? NATO has to deal with this firstly," Erdoğan said.
He added that Akif Çağatay Kılıç, his chief adviser, will chair a meeting on Wednesday, where he will give the message: "This is the opinion of our president, definitely do not expect anything different in Vilnius."
The fourth meeting on a permanent joint mechanism between Türkiye, Finland, Sweden and NATO started in the Turkish capital Ankara on Wednesday. The meeting comes before the NATO leaders convene in a summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11-12.
Finland and Sweden applied for NATO membership soon after Russia launched a war in Ukraine in February 2022. Although Türkiye approved Finland’s membership to NATO, it is waiting for Sweden to abide by a trilateral memorandum signed last June in Madrid to address Ankara’s security concerns on terrorism. Sweden passed an anti-terror law in November, hoping Ankara would approve Stockholm’s bid to join NATO. The new law, effective June 1, allows authorities to prosecute individuals who support terrorist groups.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, meanwhile, said that some progress had been made in Wednesday’s talks in Ankara. Speaking ahead of a NATO Defense Ministers meeting in Brussels, he said that Sweden fulfilled its responsibilities. He stated that he spoke to Erdoğan and the Turkish president told him that the meeting concluded positively, according to reports from Turkish media outlets.
He noted that Sweden changed its Constitution upon Türkiye's request and "strengthened the counter-terrorism laws." He also welcomed Stockholm's announcement on the extradition of a terrorist PKK-linked individual to Türkiye.
"This is good for the fight against terrorism, but also good for Sweden's efforts to fight organized crime," he said.
"These groups are linked," he said, explaining that the same people conducting organized crime in Sweden are also responsible for terrorist actions in Türkiye.
Touching upon the Zangezur corridor that will connect Türkiye, Azerbaijan and the wider Turkic world, Erdoğan said that the implementation of the corridor was not merely limited to counter obstacles that may be posed by Armenia, but noted, "It is about Iran. Iran’s stance has upset us and Azerbaijan. Iran should be worried. We hope they will have a positive attitude on this issue so that we can integrate Türkiye, Azerbaijan and Iran and we may even launch a route stretching from Beijing to London."
On relations with Greece, Erdoğan said he may discuss with Kyriakos Mitsotakis during the upcoming NATO summit. "I know what I am going to tell him. I will tell (Mr.) Prime Minister to stop the armament. I don’t know what they do with so much armament. The U.S. gave them plenty of weapons, and they accepted. I wonder if the U.S. gives them for free. I think we will talk about it," he said.
Erdoğan, however, maintained that the country seeks to improve friendship. "We don’t want to have more enemies; we want to reduce the number of enemies," he added.