Ankara withdraws the veto on the entry of Sweden and Finland into the Atlantic Alliance. In exchange, he gets maximum collaboration in the fight against Kurdish groups, from the PKK to the YPG. The national press celebrates the surrender of the West to the demands of the president, who continues to negotiate with the Kremlin to operate in Syria. A diplomatic victory for the sultan, ahead of the 2023 presidential elections.
Milan () – More than a NATO member country, Turkey behaves, through its president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, like a Janus with two faces, ready to create situations of potential tension just to raise the price and counterbalance as free rider an international policy that is having an impact, and not a little, on the precarious economic situation of the Media Luna. And to add points for next year’s elections.
The last episode in chronological order is the obstruction of Finland and Sweden’s NATO application which, to put it in the words of Brussels, has been resolved with a historic agreement. From Ankara’s point of view, it is a total surrender of the Atlantic Pact, which will have serious repercussions on the credibility of the institution and shows, once again, that the West is weak and complacent with the Sultan.
After a meeting of four in Madrid, on the eve of the NATO summit that begins today, Turkey has decided to officially lift the veto. Erdogan spoke for more than four hours with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Finnish President Sauli Niinisto and Swedish Prime Minister Margaret Andersson.
In summary, at the official level, Turkey lifts its veto over the candidacy of the two countries and takes home the commitment of Helsinki and Stockholm to fight against Kurdish terrorism, which will be specified in the response to the extradition requests of alleged members of the PKK. and YPG presented by Ankara, in addition to hindering the financing and recruitment of these two organizations in their national territories. Not only that. Sweden and Finland agree to introduce restrictions on arms sales to Kurdish armed groups. Those are the official agreements.
Then there are the indirect repercussions, all of them also in favor of Ankara which, before this meeting, decisively knocked not only on the door of Brussels but also on that of Washington. Officials of the US government made it clear again yesterday that the agreement reached in Madrid has nothing to do with the probable sale of F-16s, the annulment of the sanctions to which Turkey was subjected after buying the S-400 missile system from Russia and the long-awaited readmission to the F-35 program.
However, today, on the sidelines of the summit, he will meet with US President Joe Biden and it is safe to bet that he will also arrive here with a long list of demands.
This is what Erdogan got from the West. But the two-faced Janus has seen fit to present his requirements to the Russian counterpart as well. No one went unnoticed by the announcement of a new cross-border operation against the Syrian Kurds, after having initiated “mediation” between Russia and the West on the issue of Ukrainian wheat exports.
The Turkish press applauds. Erdogan is the winner at all levels and marks an important point for next year’s election campaign.
In a broader perspective, NATO has chosen the lesser evil: to please the Turkish autocrat in exchange for an expansion of the anti-Russian front. Forgetting, perhaps too lightly, that Erdogan is allied only with himself and that in the Atlantic Alliance he behaves more like a thorn in the side than a strategic partner. Then there would be the question of the founding values of the West, once again neglected in the face of the demands of the Turkish president.
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