Turkey Refuses to Support Sweden, Finland’s Accession to NATO: Top Diplomat
Turkey maintains its negative attitude to Sweden and Finland’s plans to join NATO, because those countries support organizations designated as terrorists in Turkey and their policies towards Turkey have been hostile, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said.
"The countries seeking NATO membership (Sweden and Turkey) are supporting terrorism and impose restrictions on Turkey," he said after talks with his Czech counterpart on Saturday, adding that Stockholm and Helsinki support Kurdish organizations, deemed as terrorist ones by Ankara, TASS reported.
The Turkish foreign minister and his Czech counterpart, Jan Lipavsky, also discussed the situation in Ukraine and the looming global food crisis. Cavusoglu reiterated Turkey’s proposal to create maritime corridors enabling transportation of grain, stored in Ukrainian ports. In his words, a four-party meeting of the United Nations, Russia, Ukraine and Turkey may gather in his country soon.
"We are waiting for Russia’s response to our proposal," he said.
Earlier this week, Cavusoglu discussed the situation in Ukraine with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a "special military operation" in Ukraine following a request from the heads of the Donbass republics.
The Russian leader stressed that Moscow had no plans to occupy Ukrainian territories. In response, the West imposed major sanctions on Russia. In addition, Western countries started to provide weapons and military equipment to Kiev, whose total value is currently estimated at billions of dollars.