President Erdogan said Turkey will oppose Sweden and Finland joining NATO. Erdogan has said Turkey's objection stems from grievances with Sweden's - and to a lesser degree with Finland’s - perceived support of the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party.
“We have told our relevant friends we would say ‘no’ to Finland and Sweden’s entry into NATO, and we will continue on our path like this,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told a group of Turkish youth in the video for Commemoration of Atatürk, Youth and Sports Day, a national holiday.application to join the Western military alliance is crucial because NATO makes decisions by consensus. Each of its 30 member countries has the power to veto a membership bid.
In the remarks made available earlier Thursday, Erdogan accused the two prospective NATO members and especially Sweden of being “a focus of terror, home to terror.” He accused them of giving financial and weapons support to the armed groups, and claimed the countries’ alleged links to terror organizations meant they should not be part of the trans-Atlantic alliance.
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