Sweden's PM says negotiations with Turkey will continue as Erdoğan expects 'concrete steps'

Talks with Turkey about Sweden's NATO membership bid are underway and "will take some time," the country's prime minister, Magdalena Andersson, has said.

Describing her phone talk with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on the weekend as "good and positive," Andersson told the country's state-run agency TT that there will be more bilateral and trilateral talks between Sweden, Finland and Turkey.

Stressing she was looking forward to the upcoming negotiations with Ankara, Andersson said Sweden is one of the first countries that classified the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) as "terrorists."

Earlier, the foreign minister of Finland, Pekka Haavisto, also said he expected the issues to be solved within a few weeks.

Speaking today (May 23) at an event in Kocaeli, northwest Turkey, Erdoğan once again said Ankara expects "concrete moves" from the two countries.

He stressed that Ankara believes NATO's enlargement policy without prioritizing basic security concerns is not good for either Turkey or NATO.

Sweden and Finland on May 18 formally applied for NATO membership, but Turkey said it would block their bid, accusing the two countries of "supporting terrorism."

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(VK)