Finland still hopes to join NATO at the same time as Sweden, its head of diplomacy said on Monday, January 30, after Turkish President Erdogan raised the possibility of granting a green light only to Helsinki.
“
Our great wish was and still is to join with Sweden
,” Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto said at a press conference, assuring that the Finnish position was “
unchanged
”.
A different message for Stockholm and Helsinki
Turkish President Recep Erdogan hinted for the first time on Sunday January 29 that Turkey could approve Finland's candidacy for NATO, without doing the same for Sweden.
“
If necessary, we can give a different message regarding Finland.
Sweden will be shocked when we give a different message about Finland
,” the Turkish head of state said.
Read alsoOtan: Erdogan's blackmail of Sweden
These declarations "
show that there is a will of Turkey to move forward quickly on the process (of joining) NATO if necessary
" concerning the Finnish candidacy, underlined Pekka Haavisto.
He explained that he had since had contacts with his Swedish and Turkish counterparts, and expressed the wish that Ankara's ratification would not be split in two.
"
We have expressed our position that (the candidacies of) Finland and Sweden should be ratified together
," said the Finnish minister.
Different Turkish-Swedish
Turkey had put a stop to the accession of Sweden and Finland to NATO on Tuesday, January 24, by postponing indefinitely a tripartite meeting initially scheduled for the beginning of February and intended to remove Ankara's objections to their candidacy.
Read alsoOtan: Erdogan is closing the door to Sweden more and more
The Turkish president had warned the day before that Sweden, already accused by Turkey of harboring Kurdish "
terrorists
", could no longer count on the "
support
" of Ankara, after a far-right activist burned a copy of the Koran in Stockholm.
Stockholm had deplored a "
deeply disrespectful
" act and expressed its "
sympathy
" to Muslims, stressing that the Swedish Constitution prevented the prohibition of this type of action, without however extinguishing Turkish anger.
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