“We don’t pay money to terrorist organisations, certainly not weapons,” Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersen said at a press conference in Stockholm.
Andersen expressed her will to remove the “ambiguity” in this regard, which emerged in the Turkish accusations.
On Wednesday, Swedish and Finnish delegations began talks in Ankara to try to resolve this dispute, which prevents the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) from starting negotiations to annex these two Scandinavian countries.
Turkey, a member of NATO since 1952, meaning that it is in a position to prevent the accession of any country, has published the list of conditions for lifting this sudden obstruction.
In particular, Ankara demands the extradition of people on Swedish soil, which it describes as “terrorists” affiliated with its archenemy, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria.
The Turkish government also accuses Stockholm of announcing $376 million in aid for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the People’s Protection Units (YPG) and of providing them with weapons, “particularly anti-tank weapons and drones”.
Turkey is also demanding the lifting of a Swedish ban on arms exports to it, in force since a Turkish offensive in northern Syria in October 2019.
Last week, Sweden and Finland submitted their candidatures to join NATO, in a major shift in the countries’ decades of military neutrality.
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