A leaders’-level meeting will take place between Turkey, NATO, Sweden and Finland on Tuesday as part of the summit in Madrid, Presidential Spokesperson Ibrahim Kalın said Sunday.
Noting that the meeting will take place to discuss the NATO membership of Finland and Sweden, Kalın said Turkey expects a clear stance from both countries against the PKK terrorists and their Syrian offshoots YPG and PYD.
“Attending this summit does not mean we are taking a step back from our position,” Kalın told a live broadcast on Habertürk TV.
Turkey has so far held two meetings with the two Nordic countries and will hold its third meeting ahead of the Madrid Summit on Monday with the participation of Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Önal in Brussels.
Kalın said Turkish officials have explained their stance to their counterparts and will not change it.
“We told them that the ball is in their court now,” Kalın said, adding that Turkey expects the two countries to take action.
He also noted that if the three countries can reach an agreement on disputed issues in Brussels, then the meeting in Madrid can be more productive.
Kalın also said Turkish officials expressed their disturbance about the Swedish state television, which aired an interview with YPG/PYD leader Salih Muslim on May 25, the day when the Swedish delegation was in Ankara to hold discussions.
Turkish officials said they do not consider the NATO summit as a final deadline for resolving its objections to Finland and Sweden joining the Western defense alliance.
Sweden and Finland formally applied to join NATO on May 18, a decision spurred by Russia's war on Ukraine, which began on Feb. 24.
But Turkey, a longstanding member of the alliance, has voiced objections to their membership bids, criticizing the countries for tolerating and even supporting terrorist groups such as the PKK and the Gülenist Terrorist Group (FETÖ).
Ankara called on Stockholm and Helsinki to prevent the terror group from collecting funds, recruiting new members, and ensuring that it ends its activities and propaganda against Turkey
Turkey said documents it received from Sweden and NATO in response to the earlier written demands it presented the two candidates were far from meeting its expectations and any negotiations must first address Turkish concerns.
While the two Nordic countries said talks to resolve the dispute would continue, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said that Ankara had not received any responses to its demands, including stopping support for terrorist groups, lifting arms embargoes on Ankara and extraditing terrorism suspects it seeks.
NATO leaders will convene in Madrid on June 29-30. Any NATO membership requires the approval of all 30 members of the alliance. Turkey has been a NATO ally for more than 70 years and has the alliance's second-biggest army.
