Turkey will wait for more concrete steps — including a freeze of “terror assets” in Sweden and Finland — before giving a nod to the Nordic enlargement of NATO, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Wednesday while speaking on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Bucharest.
“We are not dismissing the steps that have been taken so far. However, there have been no concrete steps on some issues such as extraditions and freezing of terror assets,” he said.
Sweden and Finland gave up their neutrality policy in the face of Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine. Turkey demanded security guarantees from both countries in return for its support to the enlargement — a process that requires the unanimous consent of all member states within the 30-member security bloc.
Both Nordic countries pledged to lift arms embargoes against Turkey and address Ankara’s security concerns under a deal agreed upon in June during the NATO leaders’ summit in Madrid. Turkey’s security demands involve restrictions on the activities of groups and individuals that Ankara considers “terrorists,” extradition of dozens of people over their alleged ties with those groups, and finally an “asset freeze” against those groups — a demand that has not been publicly expressed by any Turkish official up until today.
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