Turkey gives Open track for Finland to join NATO. This was announced this Friday by Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a press conference in Ankara together with his Finnish counterpart, Sauli Niinistö. There, the Turkish president has indicated that he has given the green light to Finland’s accession, while negotiations for Sweden’s will continue.

“We will begin the process of transferring to Parliament the protocol of Finland’s accession to NATO“, has indicated Erdogan, who has specified that he hopes that the process can be completed before the elections, scheduled for May 14. “I have signed the protocol and we will send it to Parliament. I hope that the process is completed before the elections,” he said.

The coalition formed by Erdogan’s party, the Islamist AKP, and the nationalist MHP has a majority in Parliament and the opposition has not opposed Finland’s entry into the Alliance, so in principle the passage through the chamber will be a formality easy.

“Turkey is one of the biggest supporters of NATO’s open door policy. We have seen that Finland has taken sincere steps to deliver on promises contained in the Madrid tripartite memorandum,” said Erdogan, referring to the document signed last July.

On the other hand, however, he has pointed out that Ankara has seen the need to separate Swedish process from Finnishby not attending Stockholm to the Turkish demands to extradite people that Turkey considers linked to terrorist organizations, especially from the Kurdish sphere.

“We are not against Sweden. But Sweden has opened its arms to terrorists, has opened its streets for them. I told the prime minister of Sweden to send us 120 terrorists. Since they have not been given to us, we cannot have a positive stance for them. In Finland, that doesn’t happen and that’s why our position is positive,” Erdogan said.

Niinistö, for his part, thanked his host for his gesture, but recalled that Sweden must also join the Alliance: “With the signatures placed today, the Turkish Parliament begins the ratification process. Thank you very much. We have a neighbor who is sweden and Finland’s entry into NATO cannot be complete without Sweden“, has affected.