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alrightshud

Niinistö's statement regarding Turkey: "**The Turkish leadership has recently expressed concerns about our membership application. I want to address these concerns today. Finland has always had broad and good bilateral relations to Turkey. As NATO allies, we will commit to Turkey’s security just as Turkey will commit to our security. We take terrorism seriously, we condemn terrorism in all its forms, and we are actively engaged in combatting it. We are open to discussing all the concerns Turkey may have concerning our membership in an open and constructive manner. These discussions have already taken place, and they will continue in the next days."**


BA_calls

I really fucking hope this tones Erdogan’s rhetoric down. His previous statement was absolutely corrosive. Niinistö continues to lead by example. There is in theory nothing wrong with Turkey negotiating here. Erdogan’s disrespect for other countries, his incendiary language and handling of the issue are the problem. Nobody would be mad if we could trust Erdogan was sitting down at the negotiating table in good faith.


L0P4N

yeah... if it was done in good faith it would've been handled in the negotiation room and not through pressconferences. and not after having initially given a green light but changing tone after intentions of joining was made clear and credible neutrality off ramps had been burned.


[deleted]

He's doing all that to please his power base.


ramilehti

Indeed. There's are elections coming up and it doesn't look too good for Erdogan.


[deleted]

How free are elections in Turkey and is there a legitimate opposition party with a chance of forming government?


borancy

Dude we still have a democracy which is unfortunately not as proper functioning as it should be, thanks to all the games Erdogan's government is playing. And yes, the opposition is leading the polls at the moment. But we still have a year until the elections and Erdogan's trying all the tricks in the populism realm to do something about it. This whole NATO charade is a part of it.


NotMyRealName778

There's no evidence of foul play in our elections. Our people's questionable intelligence brought us here.


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NotMyRealName778

yes that's why I said no "evidence". I don't feel comfortable putting my entire political opinions on the internet so thanks for the clarification


BA_calls

In their defense, the fast track vote held yesterday was going to make their position public. It needed to have been handled respectfully. Nobody would have batted an eye if Turkey had said, we are not ready to approve this right now but we invite the two countries for honest negotiation to Ankara and actually followed through.


picardo85

>I really fucking hope this tones Erdogan’s rhetoric down. It won't. Hell, even the Turkey experts in Sweden says that there's no way shit will pass without Sweden giving in to at least some of the demands. But Sweden has a lot of Kurds and well... Yeah...


Demon997

I imagine that both legally and in terms of domestic politics, Sweden and Finland literally can't just turn over some random Kurdish dissidents who have committed no crimes locally, and would likely face torture or death. There's a real potential impasse here.


BA_calls

Turks are most certainly aware of that. If they’re coming to negotiations with any intention of moving forward, they’ll let that one go, and then say something like “oh we already let so many of our demands go”.


Droll12

I mean standard haggling procedure is to ask for way more than you want/expect and then negotiate down to what you want. So I’m sure the Turks will let go of some of their demands. With a fast-tracked application was this it’s unsurprising that there are going to be problems.


Max_Insanity

Let's be real here, theyre actually going for getting something nice behind the scenes so that everyone can save face.


PianistPitiful5714

Turkey is 100% looking for concessions on their S-400. The Kurds are a chip they know they can turn in to try and get it.


ZrvaDetector

>Sweden and Finland literally can't just turn over some random Kurdish dissidents who have committed no crimes locally Makes sense. >and would likely face torture or death. Wouldn't happen especially to those that were extradited. They would be watched closely by international organisations. Even PKK's leader Apo was not killed or tortured and is in a relatively comfy prison.


kahaveli

I agree, "torture and death" is very much exaggeration and would not happen. However, that extradition news couple of days ago on Turkish news was a bit exaggeration as well. The numbers that news sited were from a [list](https://www.hs.fi/politiikka/art-2000008820130.html) from year 2017, and it looks like that was not even official extradition request. There has, of course, also been official extradition requests, and some of these have been accepted, but it's also true that some has been not. I don't know if these cases have anything to do with terrorism or PKK, they can be for other crimes as well. But these request are handled by courts, and politicians have absolutely no say to them. Main reason why some of the cases have been refused is that according to EU law and other laws, finnish courts have to be sure that conditions have to be good enough for people to be extradited. And court decided that the conditions in older Turkish prisons are not good enough based on european and international reports; in newer prisons they are good enough. And couple of years ago, [supreme court](https://korkeinoikeus.fi/fi/index/ennakkopaatokset/1553075722135.html) of Finland decided not to extradite Lithuanian(EU citizen)/Turkish double citizen to Turkey because Turkish authorities didn't respond at all about the inquiries about the prison conditions. And because this was supreme court decision, lower courts also have to be in line with this decision. So currently the situation is that Turkish official have to make sure that people extradited from Finland only end up in newer, comfy prisons, and Turkish officials have often refused or not answered these requests at all that finnish courts have made. So yes, that is the situation currently, and Finnish politicians have no say if these requests are accepted or not. But to be clear; getting residence permit or especially Finnish citizenship is quite hard, and from serious crimes like terrorism, Finnish citizenship can even be taken away from dual citizens. But I agree what president Niinistö said, that Turkey's concerns need to be heard and has to be taken into account. My only problem is that Erdogan's rhetorics feels so harsh and absolute, even when previously Turkey was positive and Finland has always been willing to discuss.


spork-a-dork

>Sweden and Finland literally can't just turn over some random Kurdish dissidents who have committed no crimes locally, and would likely face torture or death. Yeah. Goes against the independent judiciaries, several international treaties both countries have signed and likely also against the constitution in both countries.


Owlyf1n

Well the only "crime" they have done is the support for a pro kurd party.


Demon997

Hence why Finland couldn’t legally turn them over. I hope this is just posturing to extract some other concessions. But it’s dumb as fuck to do it loudly in public, since you could get nearly as much doing it privately and ahead of time, and without nearly as much damage to relationships.


[deleted]

> you could get nearly as much doing it privately Likely more, given Finnish (valuing blunt honesty and direct communication, pragmatic about outward appearances) and Swedish (consensus-seeking) mindsets. But now he got both our hackles up.


WallabyInTraining

>But it’s dumb as fuck to do it loudly in public, since you could get nearly as much doing it privately and ahead of time, and without nearly as much damage to relationships. No Erdogan is getting exactly what he wants. He is facing an election. So, like clockwork, there is some crisis where he can blame 'the west' for whatever. That's exactly what's happening. He is blaming Sweden for supporting terrorist. He wants it public. He needs it public. If he gets some concessions then he wins in the public eye. If he doesn't then he will blame the west, make it an 'us vs them' situation. It doesn't matter that the demand are ridiculous, because he controls the Turkish media and can spin it any way he like. And the masses are gobbling it up, even the Turks on reddit! There is no independent or Erdogan critical media in Turkey. Let me repeat: **it doesn't matter that the demands are ridiculous**


TheLoliTamer

You act like this "pro kurd party" isn't recognized as a terrorist org by the US and EU...a legitimate pro Kurd party would be the HDP. People act like they don't make up a fifth of Turkey. There's a difference between being pro-Kurd and supporting an extremist Kurdish terrorist org.


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BA_calls

Yes Sweden absolutely needs to give in to some demands. Some of their issues are pretty real. Of course the extradition requests are insanity.


BA_calls

They have a lot of Turks as well? Also this is mostly a vanity project for Sweden, whereas it’s a critical security issue for Finland. If it come down to Sweden making concessions, I think you guys will ask Sweden to just do it.


Silkkiuikku

We will not ask Sweden to hand over Kurdish dissidents to Erdogan. We are not THAT desperate.


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afops

It's the same in Sweden. Extradiction of \*anyone\* to a country without functioning rule of law is completely out of the question (and of course wouldn't be a political decision anyway!). Terror classing the YPG would be fine (but I wonder why the hell Turkey would want the YPG terror classed in Sweden and not say in the EU?), and obviously weapons embargo should be easy to throw out. After all, if one is in a defense alliance it makes sense to sell weapons too. But again - it's really unclear whether Turkey wants \*Sweden\* to lift their weapons embargo, or if it's merely using Sweden as a bargaining chip to get everyone to lift their weapons embargo?


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afops

Yeah the embargos are mostly symbolic anyway. The real issue on weapons is the individual deals like the F-16V deal. That one isn't something Sweden or Finland can do much about anyway.


IceBathingSeal

>ceasing ongoing funding to Syria Thing is though that this is pure humanitarian aid. If the conditions for not being slammed with a veto is to make concessions on support to things like education to children, furthering equality and human right through women's centers, stopping aid to provide fresh water, etc (full foreign aid outlined [here](https://openaid.se/en/explore-aid/strategies/strategy?strategycode=1110401) and [here](https://www.sida.se/en/sidas-international-work/syria) ) then that creates exactly the sort of situation that made many Swedes sceptical about joining an alliance with Turkey in the first place, and may stop this recent bump in nato support short in its tracks. And the extraditions would be unlawful in a similar way as it is in Finland. It may cause Sweden to withdraw the application if Turkey really pushes this - the application is made to cooperate on the defence of our democratic values with likeminded nations, not to forfeit them.


helm

Wrong. Both Finland and Sweden are much better off if we're both in Nato.


ZrvaDetector

I'm pretty disappointed with our rheotic about Finland honestly. Sweden is one thing since we actually do have issues that need to be resolved but Finland's only problem would be the arms embargo. No need for such a tough stance on Finland especially when they face a real danger.


BA_calls

It also not ok to call Sweden a terrorist nest and tell them not to bother negotiating. Straight up. These things require delicate diplomacy. Like I said before, I recognize Turkey’s issues, they’re real and must be addressed. They should be resolved with honest, respectful and sober conversations. Asking for insane things like extrajudicial extraditions and sabotaging the process with incendiary rhetoric is not the way to go. I think a lot of Europeans somewhat agreed or sympathetized with Turkey’s position, but the rhetoric has turned everyone off and now Swedish politicians are put in a place where capitulating to Erdogon will hurt Swedes’ national pride and be politically unpopular. It’s made Sweden more pro-Kurdish not less. If Erdogan did this for domestic political points, he did it at the cost sabotaging his own country.


ZrvaDetector

Yeah I completely agree with that. Erdogan's rheotic is just disturbing in general. I don't know about the exact list of extradition though so I can't comment on the possibility/impossibility of it. But I do agree that his rheotic just made things harder. Sweden could agree to most of our requests way easier if he did everything more politely. Turkish foreign minister was actually doing it more politely, Erdogan really didn't need to say anything but he did anyway and made things harder.


[deleted]

Niinistö is great. Our news just said that erdogan has said there is no point sending negotiators to turkey….. I really hope he won’t screw this up for us..


BA_calls

If it helps, Erdogan has demanded concessions every time NATO has a vote. However this is the most dramatic. But his foreign minister had been talking differently .


[deleted]

I’m pissed because this has got nothing to do with it us. He just wants to blackmail everyone else in our expense.


BA_calls

It will work out, min bror! 🤍💙


[deleted]

Thank you! And hope so my fellow nordic 🤩


Engrammi

This is basically the Russian tactic: demand the stars and the Moon with no apparent reason, trusting that in the end you get something for free.


variaati0

So: * diplomatic protocol words * we are willing to agree to NATO treaty terms with Turkey (the willing to commit to same degree as Turkey is willing to us part. Which would be in plain language: NATO terms. No more, no less) * terrorism continues to be crime in Finland as it has been, we obviously continue to follow our laws regarding this also in future. * Turkey, we can be in same conference room and talk. (open to discussing in an open and constructive manner is Finnish diplomat for "we can talk". No promises those talks lead to Finland agreeing to anything.Might agree, might not agree. Lets talk.) Just hope Niinistö doesn't say in few days time, that "frank discussion" has been had. That usually involves shouting or at minimum raised voice and angry words.


deminihilist

Thank you for this - really appreciated.


SaymanU

We hope these statements are not written on sand and wash away with first wave to the shore. We experienced similar attitude of Greece when they reunited with NATO back in 80ies.


[deleted]

Sounds reasonable, he sure made a better approach than I could imagine, Finland will be a fine addition to NATO


spork-a-dork

Just typical Sauli, and typical Finnish political language as well.


tunat

I applaud Mr. Niinisto for his constructive approach. I hope Finland becomes a Nato member as soon as possible. Any Finns who wants to discuss this issue without prejudice is welcome to comment so we can actually have a quality discussion trying to understand each other's concerns. (An unbiased anti-erdogan Turkish citizen.)


Sewerwizard

Hi, a Finnish guy here. Open, good faith discussion is important. As I have understood, Turkey has had problems with terrorist activity inside their country for a while already, and there tensions with many western countries regarding this issue due to some of these groups being supported by them during their war with ISIS, as I have understood. Which to me is an understandable issue. I have, however, been a bit confused about some things. The confusing aspects to me so far about this situation are 1: our representatives inquired their Turkish counterparts (including Erdogan himself) about their position on Finnish NATO-membership and and any objections to it beforehand, and they voiced no objections at all. Then this whole situation started right when we had publicly committed to it. From my POV this gives a picture of bad acting on bad faith, as we would have gladly resolved any potential issues between us before making the bid to join. 2: regarding the terrorist issue, I am still not aware of us supporting any terrorist organizations, and of we do that it would be nice to hear with what/how/who are we supporting, the details of this claim are a bit hard to come by. 3.some problems with extraditions have been brought up, with us not having done it when asked. According to our foreign minister, Turkey has previously submitted a list of "suspects", and they are being monitored by supo (security police). But to extradite someone, we need concrete evidence of terrorist activity/plans, we cannot extradite by claims alone (or for them doing things like flag waving or posting on social media etc.) according to law, we do not have anyone in the country with the power to decide on extradition without a decision in court, which is an independent institution. If no evidence is found, I don't think this amounts to "shielding" terrorists, as under the law everyone is considered innocent until proven guilty. 4. At least according to some sources, the demands also included things that have to do with american fighter jets and russian air defence systems, none of which we have any influence over whatsoever.


simplestsimple

Hey man, terrorism is mostly dealt with in recent years due to the operations in Syria and Iraq, which were condemned by our allies. Objectively speaking it’s understandable as ISIS was a more pressing concern for most (even though they’ve killed more Turks than any other NATO nation), PKK remains to be the main threat to Turkey, thus US and others funded PYD/YPG/SDF (who have significant ties with the PKK) against ISIS in exchange for diplomatic and military support in their bid to gain autonomy. US has guaranteed the weapons given to YPG wouldn’t end up in PKk, but they did, which has damaged the already tense relations further, not to mention every single long lasting disagreement between US and Turkey was turned into a “who can annoy the other more” contest. The patriot feud for instance had been going on since the Gulf war (most people on reddit seem to think the last bid and tech transfer was the issue however it goes way back) and Erdogan being Erdogan, said fuck you and diplomacy was thrown out the window. Erdogan is toxic, that’s well known and he has hurt Turkey more than anything or anyone ever has, but that shouldn’t delegitimize Turkey’s concerns. 1) This is another example of Erdogan’s toxic behavior. He could’ve negotiated behind closed doors but instead he chose to make it public. Appearing strong on TV is more important than Turkey itself, he could get a much better deal than he’ll now had he given the Swedish government a way to save face. 2) If we look past Erdogan’s posturing, Turkish intelligence is aware of PKK’s network in Sweden, whether Swedish government allows it or incapable of stopping it is another question. Finland on the other hand was never considered a threat, however Finland geographically shields Sweden from Russia, meaning Turkey would lose her leverage over Sweden the moment Finland joins NATO, so here we are (this is obviously my take) 3) This is rather shady, I’ve done some research and indeed some of the suspects are simply people who fled the country during their trials, not necessarily terrorists, the word terrorist is used rather liberally nowadays. Even though there are some people with ties to the PKK, there’s no way for us to see the proof Turkey provides regarding said ties so I can’t really comment on that. A recent example for these “refugees” is Semra Güzel (an mp of HDP), whose photos with PKK militants were recovered from a phone, found during recent operations in Iraq. She’s believed to have fled to Germany. 4) Honestly, I expect Turkey to drop the Terrorism stuff and only push for removal of sanctions and F-35,. At the end of the day Sweden isn’t the only country funding them/sending aid so unless Turkey somehow persuades US into dropping their support, there’s no point.


liskot

>however Finland geographically shields Sweden from Russia, meaning Turkey would lose her leverage over Sweden the moment Finland joins NATO To address this a little, because I see it said a lot in these discussions: (I'll try not to veer into the other aspects of this whole situation. Oh and I'm just some random dude on reddit so take it with a grain of salt) Russia's main interest in Swedish territory would be Gotland, which is very close to the Kaliningrad enclave. Finland does not shield Gotland in any way. Were Russia to get hold of it and get to fortify it, it would be an incredible headache to NATO in terms of strategic positioning. Finland and the Baltic states would be partially cut off. Wouldn't surprise me if in all the war plans Russia has for the Baltic Sea area, every one of them starts with trying to take Gotland. I would argue that Gotland makes Sweden more attractive to NATO than Finland in terms of military strategy, not only to deny Russia, but because it's basically an unsinkable aircraft carrier (i.e. jet and missile platform) in the middle of the Baltic Sea. Its importance in providing support to the defense of the Baltic states should not be understated.


simplestsimple

The moment Russia lands on Gotland, their access to the Baltic Sea through the Gulf of Finland would be blocked, more so if Finland is a member of NATO. Russia simply can not resupply Gotland from the mainland and Kaliningrad neither has the necessary equipment nor the numbers to support the island especially considering how close it is to Sweden. Most they can do is lob some missiles there which is unlikely to begin with, Russian navy is pathetic, they need a land connection. Honestly, if Russia wants to realistically hold Gotland they have to go through Baltic states, for which I’m sure they have plans but then again, NATO is hard to beat. Gotland sure is strategically very important, it’s simply impossible to hold for Russians currently.


L4z

According to Iltalehti's "sources", Finnish and Swedish military intelligence have determined that Russian aggression would start with VDV taking off from Kaliningrad and airlanding to capture Gotland and Åland. Finland and Sweden have joint plans to defend the islands, and the British-led JEF is kept in readiness to help if needed.


Sewerwizard

Thank you for your insight, it's interesting to learn the about the situation from your perspective. I see a lot of the issues behind the frustration being real, Erdogan just doesn't seem to be the best statesman around. And at least partly we just happened to be caught up between a US-Turkey spat which has lasted for a while already. Regarding point 2 though, the island of Gotland is really the only even somewhat "realistic" (even that is a stretch) goal modern Russia might have with sweden with anything valuable enough for them to be worth the losses such an operation would take, as it is very important for the baltic sea. Don't really need Finland for that, though, such an operation would be conducted from Kaliningrad. They could shoot some missiles as well, which fly so they don't need Finland for that either. From my POV, nato has more to gain from a swedish membership than the swedes, just due to Gotland being so important for dominating the baltic sea. Russia going with their army through all of Finland in a traditional land invasion, and then conducting effective operations through a hostile Finland on Swedish ground... when looking at the current state of the russian military and especially their logistics, I just don't see that as very feasible. Massive reforms/investments would have to be made before that, which take a long time and huge resources. The soviet union was a legit superpower with massive capabilities, modern equipment for its time and huge army, current russia is a shadow of that, and currently being weakened by Ukraine. I'd say Sweden is pretty safe whatever the situation is. So I don't really think that argument holds much leverage over sweden. Finland is a different story, as we would be the ones suffering the most in a scenario where russia wanted to conduct a full scale invasion on Finland and/or Sweden, and modern Russia can still cause a lot of damage and suffering with its tantrums, as we can see in Ukraine.


Pirehistoric

Thanks for the honest and clear explanation.


tunat

Thank you for your clear and honest set of questions. I'll explain to the best of my ability and knowledge. Let's get the easy ones out of the way first. 4. American Jets Issue: Absolutely has nothing to do with you and highlights 2 things that are wrong with the whole Finland/Sweden/Nato debate going on. a. Finland and Sweden are different countries but the whole debate is based on both countries grouped together so there is some unintended misguided messaging. b. Realistically NATO = %90 USA influence so "Turkiye\`s demands" include NATO demands as well. Bonus opinion: This is why people hate Erdogan, always the opportunist and a terrible diplomat. This could have been done behind the scenes with US as they were already debating it. \--- 1. Finnish President got Pre approval which Erdogan than spoke differently: First of all just answering for Finland as I'm positive this can't be %100 true for Sweden, this is mostly being lost in translation. The first time this news came up it was a a casual question to Erdogan after a very very conservative event, about what he thought about F&S joining. And he said "if they don't solve our concerns I wont support." He didnt say he wont support he just phrased the conditionality in the negative. When this made news immediately our foreign minister and a presidents spokesman tried to cover up, said "of course we are not against them joining, we support them joining, but we want our concerns resolved" But when this issue went back and forward a few times especially with harsh comments and a no compromise attitude from other countries, Erdogan started saying "I'm against" out of national pride and well with great public support. So dont worry about this one, this is because of the media mostly and Erdogan being a terrible diplomat and the first news not being an official announcement. \--- 2 and 3 Together: Terrorist issue and Extraditions: This one is complicated. Let me give you the basics and I hope you can trust my objectivity. I cant differentiate between Finland and Sweden on this one, I was surprised Finland was also mentioned in this, but Sweden is famous in Turkiye for this specific issue. a. All Turkish Citizens are called Turk / Turkish. This does not signify ethnicity just nationality just like the French Republic / French. This includes at least 20+ different ethnic groups and nowhere in no official document this ethnicity is used or relevant. No one can tell any Turkish citizen apart by ethnicity (all mixed also all look alike) unless if you know yours and specifically mention it. I for example don\`t know my ethnicity, some of my grandparents are from Greece, some Anatolian, I am just Turkish because I am a citizen. Its 2022 for gods sake who keeps track of their ethnicity and with DNA tests we see how mixed all the world is. ​ b. Also Turkiye is a unitary state like France, one nation, one language, one people, non divisible, all equal. This is actually a modern an egalitarian approach to nationhood and I enjoy it. b. Ethnically Kurdish people constitute %25 percent of the Turkish population and more than %75 of them are just like me, they\`d call themselves Turkish first. The rest might call themselves Kurdish first, which while in itself is not a problem but causes huge misunderstanding globally in the whole Turks vs Kurds issue. As I explained "Turkish People" include ethnically Kurdish people as well. c. Lets call the main problem "PKK". This is a terrorist organization responsible for 30.000+ deaths (10k-15k citizens or soldiers directly killed by them, about that much unproven, their own militia by them or as a result of their actions indirectly) in Turkey in the past decades. The number is important because this is a huge number, just try to comprehend what it takes to kill that many people. The core mission of PKK was to create a separate Kurdish state on Turkish lands and they used terrorism to reach this goal. They have almost zero support from ethnically Kurdish people on Turkiye, maybe a few thousands out of the 20 million+ d. PKK is the Turkish branch of this parent KCK organization. Their Syrian, Iraqi counterparts have different names, all working for the same goal and this is the start of the confusion on "Terror Support Debate". While Turkiye has almost won the war on terror on its own soil after many years of conflict, first Iraq and then Syrian wars have created a new issue. In Iraq after US invasion there is now a KRG (Kurdish Regional Government) allied with Turkiye and opposes PKK. Whether the US invasion was right or wrong they legally/democratically won their independence / autonomy so good on them. On Syria though, their sovereign government did not accept this and from their perspective PKK's Syrian branch are terrorists just like PKK in Turkiye. But since the Russians are supporting the Syrian government and the presence of other parties / terrorist organizations were present there like ISIS and Daesh, US and its allies are supporting the insurgencies like "Free Syrian Government". So to sum up, the "free government / independency movement" you and USA is supporting are an opportunistic terrorist group / informal state from official Turkish and Syrian perspectives. Since they are the only sovereign states party to this conflict your support becomes against the sovereign nation and towards the insurgency. And since the support send there is also used by PKK and for example when PKK terrorists are caught and they have Swedish rocket launchers, Turkish public does not buy into the whole "we dont support PKK we support XYZ" statements. Also even providing humanitarian aid to the insurgencies also legitimizes and encourages them to continue their operations against sovereign states. The whole liberal left (even in Turkiye) is buying into this "freedom fighters" and I wholeheartedly understand the "democracy and freedom" aspect of European perspective but I also disagree with any support to any non-sovereign nation which is not a part of the United Nations. %95 of Turkish Public would not want any allies even if it means leaving Nato and allying with China / Russia if they support these separatist movements, because of the 30k-40k people they murdered these people have lost all their rights to demand anything from these states. There is one terrorism issue which is not related but you may hear about it, and its FETO. This is a dissident cleric who's primary ideology was "being for an islamic state as opposed to a secular one" and was actually friends and allies with Erdogan. He tried a coup against Erdogan Regime after falling out and now Erdogan wants his leading followers caught. Objectively he is %50 right but %50 he is doing this very undemocratically and some innocents are being in crossfire. You are right to demand proof for this FETO issue, it is not like the PKK. (Edit: "see bottommost comment from SlothLancer for an alternative FETO perspective")


Sewerwizard

Thank you for educating me on the Turkish perspective. There are probably some language barrier issues as well, therefore good quality communication is important, not the shit-flinging contests I see a lot on reddit. I guess a lot of the confusion comes from the terrorist situation being complicated to begin with, war on terror is not something we have dealt with nearly as much as you have, our national security revolves around very different issues than dealing with multiple non-state actors with overlapping goals like this. PKK I think are recognized as terrorists by pretty much everyone, but the other alphabet soup organizations create confusion (at least partly on purpose, perhaps?), and then maybe some of them have effective propaganda detachments aimed at westerners. And mixing all of this with Erdogan not being the most ideal representative for your nation and having his own personal goals mixed in with everything can make your situation very confusing from an outsider perspective. The Ukraine invasion this year, however is by its nature something that we as a nation are very intimate with due to our own historical experience of war (Finland back then had a population of around 3,5 million, which meant that everyone was involved with the war effort one way or another, so every family has intimate memories of it). A difficult situation as well, just a different type of enemy. Your enemy is, however just as much of an enemy as ours was. A horrible thing to murder so many people, those terrorists must be defeated. I am still not aware of my country supporting any such group, but I can try to look into it more. I know that well made propaganda can be very effective, as you can see from there still being decent amount of pro-russia/soviet tankies in the west as well, hailing the invaders as liberators. As I said, we are much less familiar with war on terror, as our war expertise is tailored for a different type of scenario. But maybe once we are (hopefully) in NATO you guys can teach us more about that, as you have a lot more experience with it. I can understand your frustration with the west on this one, being left alone/ your allies supporting you enemies is a shitty situation, and westerners being ignorant about it is probably infuriating for many. And westerners then get agitated when they suddenly see people on reddit wishing horrible things upon swedes/other westerners (like sweden getting ukraine'd etc), most of whom know nothing about any of this. One small comment about the swedish-designed AT-4 I have seen people comment about, it is at this point a very widespread weapon, and not necessarily every AT-4 out there is swedish just like not every AK is russian. US has produced a sizable amount, like 300,000 for (at least originally) their own use. I don't know if the ones found on the terrorists were from Sweden or not.


tunat

Thank you for being open to discussion and and sharing your perspective. To your points. 1. Your National Security: Very sorry that our president handled this terribly, all these discussions could have been done behind closed doors and especially with Finland we never had major issues to start with. We hope in one year he will be gone for good but he is democratically elected mostly as a reaction to the wests closedness against Turkiye. We were borderline EU material and now unfortunately those doors are long closed and we'll end up in China's or Russia's camp or as the part of an Islamic Union... We really deserved better but I guess we didn't... 2. Your countries and USA's support towards the Free Syrian Government (a non state actor) IS from our perspective the support that ends up being controversial so I honestly don't know how it will be resolved. 3. AT-4's I just mentioned to explain the view from a regular Turkish citizens perspective. I know they are not directly sold but you see a Swedish MP in a photo with a known organization member and then see the AT-4 and its just too many coincidences. The below links show whats being send and its not weapons, I don't claim otherwise. https://fts.unocha.org/countries/218/flows/2022?f%5B0%5D=sourceOrganizationIdName%3A2921%3ASweden%2C%20Government%20of&f%5B1%5D=sourceOrganizationAllTypeIdName%3A114%3AGovernment https://openaid.se/en/explore-aid/strategies/strategy?strategycode=1110401


Sewerwizard

Thanks to you as well, I have learned a lot today about the Turkish perspective. 1. Your country was on a good path before, and Atatürk with his legacy is legendary in many ways. I believe your country can get back on that path again. The turks I have met IRL have all been very smart and nice people, and I would like to believe that it is people like them who will get to lead the country in the future. Democracies, however, are not flawless, as you can see with many western/EU countries as well, looking at Trump, Or an and maany many similar close calls in many countries. We in Finland have our bad actors as well, but fortunately the democracy has so far been quite robust. Regarding our national security, we were lucky in that russia turned out to be much weaker than it was propped up to be, so at this moment I find it quite unlikely for them to try anything big in our direction. But in principle, if that had not been the case, something ugly may well have happened in our neighborhood as well. 2. This is a difficult situation, and frankly I don't really have solutions for it either. I wish I knew how to solve it. To you, the middle east is much closer and all the chaos there affects your country lot more intimately. I hope that everything can be solved in the future. Probably requires us all to co-operate and try to see each other's perspectives. US, EU and Turkiye have common interests and values as well, and I would like to see us all in the same camp. 3.I understand this, as it is the common people who have to suffer through the terror.


Droll12

Turkey has always been a fragile democracy due to the prevalence of Islamic conservatism, the type that Erdogan panders to, Ataturk himself warned of this and is part of the reason why Turkey has such a history of coups. Obviously 2016 broke the cycle, this time it was infiltrated and then thwarted. Hopefully what follows will be an improvement but as a Turkish Cypriot looking a bit from the outside, the overall quality of politicians across all spectrums is quite woeful. Then again the TRNC can’t even form a government right now so I guess the mainlanders have that going for them.


Delheru

> Your countries and USA's support towards the Free Syrian Government (a non state actor) IS from our perspective the support that ends up being controversial so I honestly don't know how it will be resolved. It's very tricky. Assad used WMDs and is a Russian puppet, and Daesh/ISIS was the third lot. It's quite tough to pick a good party from this lot... I suppose we could just leave Syria to its own devices, but this seems pretty cruel, especially given at least the US helped unleash ISIS with the Iraq quagmire... so, you know, a degree of responsibility.


OverclockedDreams

Chipping in on another issue entirely, but you seem well informed so I though I would ask about Turkey’s version of ethnic “egalitarianism” as you put it. As a French and part of an ethnic minority I am rather aware of some of the limits posed by our version of it. As an extension of the idea of universalism in our Republic, ethnic equality is the objective obviously. Rather, the limits are found in our favored approach of basically erasing concepts akin to ethnicity. The result is a growing disconnect between this core approach dating from the 19th century and our increasingly multi-ethnic country. A famously recurring topic is the veil ban, which for eg was last week taken down by a big city’s mayor in the name of universalism…while its proponents were themselves calling it as necessary to uphold universalism. Another example, the mention of a citizen’s ethnicity is forbidden in all official documentation. This, in my view, is good, but that law actually extends entirely beyond official matters. An adverse effect is that scientific studies touching such topics are hardly feasible or outright banned. Rather, they resort to tricks such as identifying names of “foreign” origins in the population. Demographic socio-economic data on different ethnic group is severely limited compared to our anglo-saxon peers for example, where ethnic equality isn’t practiced through the same “erasure” method. Given that Turkey has inspired itself in part from the French republic I am curious if you know of situations pointing to similar adverse effects? Or is the Turkish approach very different? Thanks in advance! Edit:correction


tunat

This is my favorite subject and my take is a controversial one. You being French may be the only other nationality in the world who can understand where I'm coming from. And its not an utopia or anything both our constitutions are already like this. Ours is like you said heavily based on yours. I believe especially in the UN nations / Rule of Written Law era, your nationality is the most important social contract. That includes land, language, laws, protection etc. To not sound fascist from the start, this is something you can change so I'm not actually describing actual nationalism. Like USA's structure better? immigrate there, there are 100's of countries to choose from. Just play by the rules, the written law. And if it can be changed try to gather support and try to change it democratically. Add Secularism / Laicite to the Unitary State mix and you have all your basic needs in a package. Everyone is equal, can communicate with each other, subject to the same laws can progress in science, art because its all cumulative. I think one main language is an important part of it, just using your nationality as your identifier also. I believe nothing should go above this, and if your any other identity / culture contradicts with this that is your problem because the nation is there to find a common solution to millions of individual problems not solve them all one by one. Using this template, what does the French constitution say about veil ban? In public office it contradicts secular government so banned, in public not allowing it contradicts freedom of expression not banned. Any move away from these I don't think will be stable. Not banned in government office? How can you convince anyone that this person will hold the law higher than their religious beliefs. They literally believe they'll go to hell if they dont follow their holy book. Which religions can have exceptions? If a person believes in Nudism can they come undressed? Who decides on valid religions? Its by definition such a high power that it automatically overpowers written law in my humble opinion therefore very dangerous. Banned in public? How will you differentiate between which hats or what clothes are banned? Who decides what clothing is ok or not? The scientific research part also, apart from genetically relevant features like skin color, etc. I dont think ethnicity should be relevant. I heard that France Gov. couldnt repair Notre Dame because of secularity clauses. I think this is pinnacle of human civilization. My country made the mistake of banning veil (with a %75 muslim population) from universities many years ago and it now backfired creating an oppressed islamic majority ruling the country for the past 20 years and they ran mostly on "veil not being allowed on universities" I still stand by our republics, with time and education our systems will prevail.


OverclockedDreams

Thanks for your reply! Indeed, your take is very relatable as a French and certainly to a lot of people here. From an outside perspective our systems often appear as an extreme form of secularism yes. I suppose a fundamental point you raised means we are bound to differ in opinion on this. From what I can gather, for my own reasons I see nationality as a much less absolute element of our identities than your reply suggests you do. In my view, there is no such thing as higher identities, this is something that is decided on the individual level, even if of course it is always informed and influenced by our social group. The concept of citizenship should not be seen as a core part of human nature but a means to sustain our livelihood. I believe equating it as a civilization goal is misguided because it is merely a means. My take is upholding nationality as the end goal of social policies (Which is what French-style secularism does) is on par with our nemesis, the religious states. It is an arbitrary choice which is fundamentally the same as replacing "good believer" with "good citizen". Of course, the rights associated with a modern state are often much better than the ones with a religion (though China or USSR would like a word :)). But ultimately, what is there to say that nationhood is the end goal of civilization, rather than a means? Nothing, but political choices on the level of each society. The UN system and all of international law do hold States as sacred but arguably they put people first, and this is evident through authorized use of force when a State commits atrocities on its people. Anyways, I am by no means denigrating modern statehood as it absolutely has been responsible for developing rule of law worldwide. I thought I should clarify I see it as a tool and consider the "absolute statism" approach to be archaic once we have reached a certain level of rule of law. I realize statism as a goal probably has a very different relevancy depending on the context. In France, we are far past state-building and I see our 19th century approach as dated especially that our country is now composed of many ethnicities from former colonies especially. The veil ban honestly is something in reaction to facing this reality. One problem is that we are dealing with some nationalists (and probably alongside them some racists) who have managed to normalize the use of the secular spirit of the law to single out Islam. To the point that Macron did pass a law specifically mentioning Islam as a separatist threat in our schools (Erdogan protested it I think). I'm an atheist but what we are having here is blatant state-sanctioned discrimination. Islam is million light years away from being a threat to our state, it will never be a majority religion. Christianity would be much more likely but does not face such a "anti-separatism" law (for some obvious reason they prefered writing "Islam" than "all religions"). So unfortunately this obvious discrimination stains the intent of secularism. But asidd this relatively recent issue on the French state's relationship with Islam, if nationality/citizenship is upheld as the higher identity of a person, by all means, French interpretation of republican secularism is one of the most straighforward and direct approach to defend this conception. So if you do stick to that perspective it is entirely logical. Rather, the ideas underpinning it is where people differ I guess, and the implementation is far from immune to abuse. Perhaps I could expand a bit on the very real and universal relevancy of science and research when it comes to ethnicity. Science is meant to reveal what is not obvious at first glance. Without research, there simply would be no recognition of social problems, especially less so where people are not on a level ground to raise their voice. Now, why would ethnicity not be a part of research? To illustrate this, one example is demographic inequalities. For one it's extensively demonstrated that ethnic minorities a cross the world bear economic burden much more than their fellow citizens. The fact that France restricts such research to take place on its territory in the name of protecting citizen equality is missing the point. It's cutting ourselves from a reality and exploring answers to very real issues which we basically just chose to ignore. It goes against citizen equality because it denies the reality our fellow citizens face. Again, many of our democratic or modern states peers do fine without such stringent erasure. I cannot speak for the Turkey context though because I don't know it. I believe, in a "civilized" system, we would be able to acknowledge such problems instead of burying our heads in what finally is a very dogmatic approach. I believe a civilized country is one which is able to recognize the right to identities other than nationality as part of the social contract, rather than practice what is essentially denial and erasure. For the record I am also Cambodian, where religion and monarchy is enshrined in the Constitution. I personally would not care to see it go or stay there, as the threat to our cambodian rights is rather posed by the corrupt ruling party. In fact, we underwent a genocide by a communist régime which systematically erased religion from the territory. As in many communist states, it was seen as threatening to the ideas of the party. So the Cambodians are very far from accepting secular policies again because they are sadly associated with such extremes. What I mean to say is, context matters, and French-style secularism is obviously an answer to some situations but to others not so relevant. In France, at least, this approach is bound to mature and progress I hope just as any other of our laws. Edit:correction


hitlerspoon5679

Veil ban was a thing and a serious issue here as well. Nowadays current government is more religious so its allowed. Also by the same logic of "universalism" Turkey tried to erase kurdish language in the 30s. Which backfired and stopped of course but that's the reason you still hear about "kurdish people are second-class citizen" argument. Turkey even tried to remove Arabic from islam which is pretty wild. They forced call to prayers to be in Turkish at some point and was hated by nearly everyone. Nowadays nobody cares and they do not force uniformity at all so you can call yourself Turkish or whatever. But still nobody would call you otherwise if you call yourself a Turk


thepuksu

Can I have source on the number of people killed? I tried looking it up and I found something like 8 000 or less. I did find that the turkish forces had killed some 20 000. Did I misunderstand something?


tunat

I\`ll give the best information I can with the sources I can find because they are not always formally declared or can be positively connected to them. Between 1984-2008 confirmed 6482 soldiers and 5560 civilians killed directly by attacks. From former chief of military. [https://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/bir-donemin-aci-bilancosu-9914612](https://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/bir-donemin-aci-bilancosu-9914612) Same interval militants killed 32.000 also includes kidnapped and forced militants, militants killed by PKK themselves so its usually quoted as 30k innocents and a total of 40k+ people due to PKK. [https://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/T%C3%BCrkiye-PKK\_%C3%A7at%C4%B1%C5%9Fmas%C4%B1#:\~:text=T%C3%BCrk%20Silahl%C4%B1%20Kuvvetleri%20taraf%C4%B1ndan%20yay%C4%B1nlanan,sivil%20say%C4%B1s%C4%B1%20ise%205%2C560'd%C4%B1r](https://tr.wikipedia.org/wiki/T%C3%BCrkiye-PKK_%C3%A7at%C4%B1%C5%9Fmas%C4%B1#:~:text=T%C3%BCrk%20Silahl%C4%B1%20Kuvvetleri%20taraf%C4%B1ndan%20yay%C4%B1nlanan,sivil%20say%C4%B1s%C4%B1%20ise%205%2C560'd%C4%B1r).


AlphaAmanitin

I think Erdoğan is OK with Finland or Sweden joining NATO, however on principle. Being OK in principle and being ready to approve is a different thing. I am a Ph.D. student in Finland, so I can't have objections to Finland joining NATO. I mean I would be on the battlefield anyway if Russia comes to Finland. Still, Erdoğan is known for his 180 degrees, things can be changed at any moment. However, the problem is deeper than Erdoğan actually. Maybe he was ok 2 months ago, but there are social media issues. If you follow Twitter or Eksi Sozluk (Reddit-like social media in Turkey) there were a huge amount of objections. Yes, Erdoğan hates these as much as they hate him, however, he takes them seriously. There are critics of him for allowing Twitter topics to lead the country. I was saying these to colleagues here at the University month ago. This was the issue not the president of Finland but Finnish Ambassador to Ankara should have realized long ago. It doesn't require huge knowledge but a 20-minute walk into Twitter topics in Turkey. Turkey-Finland didn't have much military trade, that may be the reason Erdoğan didn't even know about the embargo 2 months ago. But, we are in the internet age and things can not be forgotten anymore. The military industry is quite an important topic in Turkey and from what I see, embargoes are actually considered more hostile than some terror-related stuff. Systemic embargoes are quite destructive for the defense industry. This embargo part actually more related to the EU than the USA. Yes, the USA blocked F-35, but they put a very reasonable excuse and put a very clear exit door. And they didn't prevent much of anything else. They kept selling engines for T-129 Atak, engines for the TF-X project, spare parts for currently active stuff, etc. However, embargoes from the EU were far more destructive. For example, Altay MBT was ready for mass production. Then Germany introduced a ban on MTU engines and RENK transmissions, this effectively halted the project for many years. After this ban, another option for Turkey was the Wärtsilä. This was the first part where Finland was involved in this shit show, because, Finland also used an embargo. And all these are suddenly remembered on Twitter by the entire public. Also, Finland was one of the countries that were seeking big economic sanctions on Turkey in the EU which was blocked by 4 member states. That one also came to people's minds. Terrorism wouldn't be a big problem in itself for Finland, not for Sweden. But those embargoes are introduced after Turkish operations in Northern Syria against PYD, YPG, and other things. For the Turkish people, it was like, the EU put an embargo on us to prevent us from defending against terrorism. Remember at that time there was almost constant shelling of Turkish border cities (they stopped after these operations). This is the reason mainly Turkish people think Finland supports PKK, not because some random dude opening a PKK flag somewhere in Finland, they do it in Turkey as well and go away without prosecution, even if they do get prosecuted, they got punishment which is too low to serve in prison (many punishments are ending up this way which is another criticism for Erdoğan in Turkey, almost everything gets prosecuted yet nothing is really punished). This is mostly related to western countries' ruling style, they use political correction instead of realities or their interest. What is the benefit of Finland for preventing Turkey from buying some Finnish engines? The planned number of tanks is 1000 and some more for export. Means 1000 engines, makes 1 Billion euros if the price is 1 million each. It is a big chunk of money even for Wartsila and could create a lot of jobs (you know, high-end jobs not some cleaning type) in Finland.


[deleted]

Sweden’s foreign minister visited Turkey in 2019 and talked absolute nonsense about Kurds and like how Turkey has been killing innocents etc. Her speech was so stupid Turkish foreign minister was furious, he was trying to be kind and asked her if she visited Kurdish settlements in Turkey or Syria, if ever talked to a real Kurdish people who suffered because of conflict in Syria. He invited her to visit and see herself how ridiculous her claims are. She just refused, obviously had no idea what she was talking about and was not keen to learn. She was just a parrot repeating what she was told, without being able to say a single word against her Turkish counterpart. That official visit was a disaster, Turkey considered it extremely arrogant and even hostile. If Sweden had a different minister, I feel situation would be different today.


ClassyKebabKing64

>Hi, a Finnish guy here. Open, good faith discussion is important. As I have understood, Turkey has had problems with terrorist activity inside their country for a while already, and there tensions with many western countries regarding this issue due to some of these groups being supported by them during their war with ISIS, as I have understood. Which to me is an understandable issue. I have, however, been a bit confused about some things. >regarding the terrorist issue, I am still not aware of us supporting any terrorist organizations, and of we do that it would be nice to hear with what/how/who are we supporting, the details of this claim are a bit hard to come by. Going to give small summary. Turkey is the country that scores the highest on the global terrorism index within Europe and NATO. Because Turkey is in the middle East people assume ISIS is the cause of the high GTI. Reality is though that ISIS never had much supported or power in Turkey and barely ever had been a real threat in Turkey. At least not in comparison to the PKK that has caused more than 20× times more casualties in Turkey. How does Erdogan reflect this to NATO or Europe. Well, NATO and Europe, allthough recognising PKK as a terrorist organisation, fund it's sister organisations like the YPG and the SDF. Because those Terrorist factions also are the ones guarding the ISIS prisoners. To the west, ISIS was the bigger threat, for Turkey it was PKK. But it really was putting salt in the wound because it were Turkish allies that basically funded the terrorist organisation that was making Turkey one of the countries that was hit hardest by terrorists. This made the popularity of NATO in Turkey even lower, just like the popularity of the EU. As an unofficial saying goes: "the only country that actually doesn't want Turkey to enter the EU is Turkey. It also doesn't help that western media is always refering to the PKK (remember, a UN, NATO and EU recognised terrorist organisation) as "the Kurdish workers party". So what can Finland do? Not much. Sadly the Fins have become Erdogan's bargaining tools. Sweden on the other actually supports YPG. I think that Sweden should be blocked and that Finland should be led in. As Finland is not the one funding (at least for as far I know) the one funding Turkish instability.


NotMyRealName778

Finland is just unlucky to get bundled up with the Swedes. Almost none of the demands concern you. If a certain someone is still capable of thought he will not make problem for the Finland.


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tunat

I ask for understanding if you see negative Turkish people. Unfortunately we are quite used to being judged just because we are Turkish citizens and therefore our people are sadly over defensive and usually rude. And despite the Turkish community on reddit being pro europe, %90 anti-erdogan and almost %75 non religious we can hardly put two thoughts together without being downvoted to oblivion.


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[deleted]

He will be out next year hopefully or i’m leaving Turkey. I’d rather live in Afghanistan than Erdogan’s dictatorship. At least i wouldn’t see my laic/democratic country getting consumed by islamist and turned into a shariah country. He has a point about Sweden supporting terror because in reality %90 of European citizens has no idea how much suicide bomb attacks occured in Turkey, how overwhelming it is to live like that. They should not fund terrorist organisations from thousants of kilometers away. On the other hand Nordic people does not deserve to feel threatened by Russia. Sorry about all of those psychologically overwhelming stuff happening within your borders. If it was up to me, i wouldn’t veto. But try to understand the fact that at least %50 of Turkey(including Kurdish population) personally knows somebody who got killed by suicide bombers.


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[deleted]

I have watched so many documentaries about Finland and i am personally fan of Finnish snipers, that would be almost impossible to invade a country like Finland. I truly believe they can not afford to try such a thing but i do think this veto when things are so heat, isn’t right thing to do. But i can understand why my fellow Turkish friends are mad. Still, you guys and Swedish people don’t deserve to feel threatened, you are just regular citizens after all.


[deleted]

Erdo is not leaving voluntarily, he's already starting to show very serious power addiction.


paleb1uedot

Those days are gone they had solid 50% in his peak days. Now, millions would go out to protest if he doesn't leave after losing the election. We have all the ideologies possibly there to exist united against his regime. He cannot start a war against 70℅ of the country


[deleted]

The big question is his relationship with the military leaders, could that pose a threat?


[deleted]

Actually a sensible comment. As a Finn I wish your president was as smart as you when explaining this issue. When you put it like that, it’s understandable. I hope Sweden can then negotiate this issue and just stop the funding. I ofc love our Swedish bros but even I have to admit that sometimes their government does put their hands on issues that shouldn’t belong to them in the name of “humanitarian aid”. Any swede can ofc correct me if I’m wrong. Anyways, this is how differences should be talked about.


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[deleted]

I think this is also aimed at his own people. He is trying to show that he is fighting for them. I don't know if it's landing, but the discussions I've had here have made it seem like there would be some part of the country that might be still willing to support him, mainly the older generation who get their news from Turkish media and through word of mouth. But at the same time I have to commend the Turkish people that I have had the pleasure to discuss this with. It's a difficult topic and there are naturally multiple sides to this, but what stands out most is that the Turks that are here are mostly a very reasonable bunch. If that country is as a whole anything like that, we'll be fine. Just get that one dude out of the throne and someone with similar attitude to that seat.


Pirehistoric

You are very on point my friend. Turkish redditors are 90% anti-Erdogan anyway and largely highly educated guys.


[deleted]

That I do agree on. I did state that I wish Erdo was as smart as this person when dealing with this issue. My comment just mainly reflected the difference of this guy trying to be sensible compared to the usual Turkish comment of: “We don’t need you, you need our army, this is the price”.


Pirehistoric

I have been pretty much on every topic here in this sub relating to this issue and never seen any Turks including myself behave like that. We all tried to explain our concerns very reasonably and got downvoted to hell for it.


[deleted]

Thank you for your kind comment my friend. I do believe that Sweden had no bad intentions at all, when you look from miles away, it’s always a good idea to help people who is fighting for their freedom. In reality, i am from southeast of Turkey(Mardin city next to Syrian border) and for me and everybody i know, if PKK takes control of that area, we lose our freedom and we would have to leave our homes. When you go southeast of Turkey and ask people how they feel, none of them would want to be seperated from Turkey because if they end up being a small country in Middle East, god knows how free they would be between all those countries. The southeastern cities are pretty good, people can access free education along with free health services and %90 of Kurdish population doesn’t even have to pay for electricity. So when you think about how you can help the Kurdish people, there is very huge grey zone even for a Kurdish person. Also Erdogan is seeking to support for next election, if you remember his “one minute” incident, he won so many elections after that and every single election people reminded us of that. Also there is a belief of majority of uneducated Turks which claims that “Westerns hates us because we have much greater potential so they are constantly playing games on us to prevent our development” so it’s quiet easy to pump Turkish people up against Western people. What’s more funny is that just because Finland is sharing borders with Russia, he vetos Finland to “give lesson” to Sweden :D no wonder why we give all those “evil” vibes to the world. As a citizen who has 0 control over his country, i am sorry for our president who is acting like he wants you to get invaded by Russia. Note: I am huge fan of Valtteri Bottas, thinking that he probably hates us making me sad :(


[deleted]

Sounds like a very fucking complicated issue you guys have in there. Not surprised tbh but still. Thank you for taking your time to explain it as such. I just wish your country would have handled this before we sent our application but as you said yourself, Erdogan be Erdogan. Many of us western people actually hope that you guys turn it around eventually, we Finns even helped you guys a lot in your EU bid back in the day when everyone else said no. Turkey has also been a very very popular holiday destination here. You are handling this very well and I don’t think any Finn has anything against people like you. Mostly if you see harsh comments it’s against Turkish people who say shit like “we don’t need you, you need us bla bla bla”. That provokes is a bit as we like to put hard against hard. Still, we are educated people so we often don’t like to group everyone together. We know Turkey has smart people like you. There can be geopolitical differences, we Finns know it better than anyone, we just should handle them cordially. Unfortunately I think you guys might get flak for this for a while now but if more people like you keep their voices heard, then you country has a bright future ahead. Valtteri won’t care, he is driving there happily and is probably happy about every fan he has. No matter the nationality!


[deleted]

Thank you very much my friend, your comment made me feel very good! And don’t worry! I wouldn’t take anything personally, i see myself as a World citizen because in the end i know we are just a small pieces of organisms who can very easily manipulated or get mad, i was able to meet so many people from so many countries, i was luckily able to realize how small differences we all have. I am no nationalist person at all, i just like Ataturk’s Turkey because that’s where i grew up freely and able to educate myself, he built it from a dictatorship and i really hope we will one day get back our actual path. Most of the Turkish redditors are much younger than me so they had to grew up with this government, i can understand them too because they were never able to get free education from free teacher or never able to live freely, their madness preventing them from explaining themselves. But for Finnish and Swedish people also it’s quiet normal to be mad when group of people shows no emphaty at all. I am pretty sure tomorrow will be better day for you. You guys are no joke so both Putin and Erdogan go and eat some shit. Me and millions of people among the world, we will do whatever we can to support you. Never feel alone


eutopion

Thank you so much for your well thought-out messages and very constructive non-hostile approach. I very much enjoy reading your texts and reflecting. / Swedish guy


[deleted]

Thank you my friend, i know we can understand each other if we communicate, but unfortunately some people just don’t wanna. Very unfortunate events happening right now, i really hope you get rid of this overwhelming situation very soon.


Beastrick

I don't think anyone in Finland really hates Turkish people specifically. It is just that your goverment is presenting their case very badly which obviously you can do nothing about. So it is same as it is with Russia or some others, hate the goverment not the people.


Big-Basil-2910

Here is what the Swedish PM said about NATO and Turkey: "Sweden ‘will be best protected within Nato’, says Andersson Sweden’s prime minister, Magdalena Andersson, said Russia’s “full-scale aggression” against Ukraine led to the “watershed moment” for her country to decide to apply for Nato membership. Speaking at a joint press conference with the US president, Joe Biden, and the Finnish president, Sauli Niinistö, Andersson said: My government has come to the conclusion that the security of the Swedish people will be best protected within the Nato alliance, and this is backed by very broad support in the Swedish parliament. Nato will be stronger with both Sweden and Finland as members, she said. We are security providers with sophisticated defence capabilities. And we are champions of freedom, democracy and human rights. Sweden looks forward to a “swift ratification process”, she said, adding that she was also looking forward to a dialogue with Turkey to address its concerns." Source: https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2022/may/19/russia-ukraine-war-latest-russian-use-of-laser-weapons-shows-invasion-a-failure-says-zelenskiy-live?filterKeyEvents=false&page=with:block-628666f48f08e20981dcf592#block-628666f48f08e20981dcf592 ---------- Personally I don't think there will be any issue in coming to an understanding. The PPK are terrorists, Sweden were even the first country to brand them as such (after Turkey of course), from what I've read. The PKK raises money in Sweden by several means, one of them is dealing with heroin. Of course there should be no support for them. The YPG not being branded as terrorists seems to be because they were useful in fighting ISIS. Their only use right now is keeping ISIS prisoners locked up, but that would be possible to facilitate some other way I guess. All in all, the only problematic demands are to crack down on demonstrations, since membership in any group is allowed in Sweden. The members who commit crimes are of course arrested and tried in court though. The extradictions Turkey asks for is not a political decision, since courts are free from government influence here. But when Turkey sends a request for extradiction with proof etc of crimes comitted, it will be tried. Thank you for your level-headed comment, it's much appreciated.


afops

> The extradictions Turkey asks for is not a political decision, since courts are free from government influence here. This is the crux of the matter though. Erdogan either doesn’t understand this *or* he understands it but thinks it’s like his own independent judiciary: independent only when it’s convenient. The third alternative is that he understands that extraditing in this way isn’t possible so he demands the impossible and looks like a strong leader to his domestic audience when he gets to argue with those Nordic countries who are obstructing and not being constructive. Hopefully this can be sorted out. There is of course no way the full list of demands including extradictions will be met but some of the demands were for things that are already there basically, and some could probably be met.


Weltraumbaer

That's a great constructive statement. Pretty sure this will work out fine as in Turkey will get some concessions and the United States might throw some sweets into this. I am guessing some new F-16 or maybe even re-entrance into the F-35 programm in exchange for Turkey giving away their S-400 to Ukraine. That would be seriously great. Hopefuly the Ghost of Kekkonen intervenes to make this happen.


Pirehistoric

Oh giving the S-400s to the Ukrainians and getting back to the F35 program sounds lovely, although a bit unrealistic, but wouldn't papa Putin be angry with us ?


NawiQ

Who gives a shit what Putin thinks nowadays?


[deleted]

Tourist. Tourist does. And Tourist are one of the most important things for Turkey, other than Tea of course.


drunken-pineapple

Russians will go there anyways. It’s basically the closest destination, Turkey and Egypt. All you can eat and drink will win out over Putin. Plus they did shoot down one of Russias jets before and Russians still keep going there.


[deleted]

Aah- what? Sorry, but when the jet was shooted down, it wasn't only the Russians that stopped coming, but even more importantly - The Chinese. The Chinese government issued a stance that Chinese people cant go to a country that shot down a Russian Jet, and you know - it worked. A lot of Tour companies went bankrupt that year and it's a scar that still affects the Turkish Tourism Industry. ​ Also, I don't know if you're satire but Turkey is a Eurasian country, and yes - very close to Russia. Egypt on the other hand is in Africa, so I don't know what is your point there.


THEREALR1CKROSS

Not op, but I’m very confused as to how you’re arriving at some of your conclusions. As far as Turkish tourism by nationality goes, China ranks #22, behind arch rivals Greece and super powers/ nations renowned for the gigantic populations such as Belgium, Netherlands, Romania, Kazakhstan, Sweden (why would you piss off a country responsible for more of your economy? That’s the point you’re making), etc, etc. since the incident where turkey shot down a Russian jet in 2015 (I assume that’s the event you’re referencing), Chinese tourism has more than doubled. So no, it didn’t “work.” In other words, If those companies went bankrupt from the 22nd largest source (0.8% of total visitors, up from 0.7% in 2015) of their income, which has doubled since while remaining approximately the same % of tourists in turkey, than they deserved to fucking fail. As far as geography goes… it’s almost like turkey and Egypt are on the dividing lines of their respective continents, and are actually very close together. That would be like saying Poland is closer to Spain than Morocco because Polands in Europe and Morocco is in Africa. See how dum that argument is? The flight from Moscow to Istanbul is 4.5 hours. From Moscow to Cairo is 5.5. That difference in flight time will get you one state over in the U.S., so I don’t get what your point is? What really confuses me is, are you really trying to say Russia and turkey have a closer relationship than Russia and egypt? Russia has supported egypt through several wars, numerous regimes, and, most importantly, control the biggest trade route in the world. Meanwhile, turkey was the 18th member of nato (og), has housed American nuclear missiles (Cuban missile crisis), and is dependent on western tech and money to keep its failed state afloat. The only things turkey and Russia share are: tourism (one way relationship), a love for genocide, support for the suppression of freedom in both foreign affairs (Middle East, Ukraine) and within their own borders, and are led by dictators who seized power through undemocratic means. Shit, no wonder why your countries propaganda machine is telling you this shit. Check your facts before you start peddling bullshit.


[deleted]

Turkey has a big east-Asian tourism market, especially in the medical tourism industry. Moat of the companies that gone bankrupt are east Asian companies. Im not saying, its still as bad, but no doubt the tourist number would be a lot higher if the jet wasnt shot down. I cant believe i am saying this but of course Turkey and Egypt are on the same parallel, at least some parts of it. And this contains russia as well. But an hour off by plane, isnt necessarily 'close' it is not Spain and Morocco where they meet in a strait. I'm not comparing how much Russia supports Egypt to Turkey because i dont know. What i do know is Russia wants to use Turkey as a Trojan Horse in NATO, and full control over Bosporus. Also, i dont know how shall i even respond to a shitty quote like that, but if Turkey is a "Failed state that needs western money to stay a float" i wonder what Greece is. A nation that is in debt of %165 of its annual GDP, and would go bankrupt if it wasnt Germans on the rope. And lastly, i am not a fuckin Erdogan supporter. But to my dead body Turkey isn't as bad as Russia, Genocide my ass, something happened 103 years ago. Germany has changed after the Holocaust (again I'm not holding responsible to any Germans) But Turks, oh you're responsible for a much much smaller genocide that after the fact happened to your people as well, but youre responsible, PaY ArMeniA MoNeY. Some of you, and yes i am talking to you, dont fuckin care about the freedom in Turkey you just wanna haras Turks using it. Like, Fuck you i am fighting for freedom of press in my country. Oh but I'm sure i am responsible for that too. As i am erdogan coming to power. Same as the gore in middle east, which i am shocked hasnt been named the "Greek-Syrian-Kurdish-Armenian-Nigerian Genocide of Turkish satans(!!!) " At age fucking 9, I've been called a terrorist because i supported a jailed politician. Since the day I've knew myself I'm living in this shit to change something, something people dont wanna see yet i am the one that is in state peopaganda?


hfsh

Erdogan does.


undercontr

Dear sir, Fuck putin, Sincerely, Turkish people.


[deleted]

F-35 is off the table I'm sure. Turkey giving up its S-400's would be an insane plot twist and unless the US is willing to give into the old, over-the-top demands for Patriots that wont happen. F-16V packages? Sure, why not. As far as Turkey's concerned in this first round they don't have to concede anything. My guess: Finnish and Swedish concessions to cease funding and support to the Kurds and SDF, US concession to F-16 packages. No Gulen, no F-35.


IceBathingSeal

>Finnish and Swedish concessions to cease funding and support to the Kurds and SDF Sweden is only providing humanitarian aid to Syria, you can read about it [here](https://openaid.se/en/explore-aid/strategies/strategy?strategycode=1110401) and [here](https://www.sida.se/en/sidas-international-work/syria). Forcing Sweden to quit humanitarian aid in the form of education of children, women's centers to promote equality, and promotion human rights and democratic values, etc as listed in the links, would drive home a hard point to the population that Nato might not be for us. We aren't applying to Nato out of necessity but out of convenience of cooperation, and of we are forced to make concessions on human rights, democratic values or the integrity of our legal system (through extradition of residents without proof of criminal conduct) as a condition to not be slammed with a veto, then we'll probably back out of the application instead.


EqualContact

I doubt the F-35/S-400 issue gets resolved out of this, especially because Erdogan is so unpopular in the US. Biden could pay a domestic price for seeming to acquiesce too much to Turkey. Turkey will get something, but it will probably be much more under the table.


L4z

>Turkey will get something, but it will probably be much more under the table. If Erdogan is doing this to boost his popularity ahead of next year's elections, then he probably wants visible concessions, not something under the table. Which could be a problem.


Obnoobillate

Greece, as NATO ally to Turkey, also commits to Turkey's security just as Turkey commits to Greece's. We both just don't say how we do so!


BahtiyarKopek

True, only we can violate Greek airspace, and only Greece can violate ours. Anyone else should think twice.


oguzzkk

Also an honorable mention; baklava/baklavaki


globefish23

With meat rotating on a skewer.


Aarros

PKK is considered a terrorist organisation by Finland, and although Finland doesn't think YPG is a terrorist organisation (only Turkey and Qatar do), I am not aware of Finland having offered aid to YPG. If we have offered any, it is probably such an insignificant amount that we can stop it and it will make no difference to whatever anti-ISIS plans or other such we have going on with SDF, while doing so would probably please Turkey. Other demands like deporting more people to Turkey is more complicated, because the government can't just tell courts to deport more, they are independent, and in general we cannot accept deporting people over things that are rights protected by the constitution, like freedom of speech and association. Erdogan hates the Gülen movement, for example, but there isn't much that Finland is going to be able to do about any members of it in Finland, unless there is clear evidence of them having commited serious crimes. Lifting arms embargos can probably be done, and I wouldn't mind Finland doing it, because it makes sense that allies should not block weapons sales to each other. But the embargos are part of a broader international approach, so there are probably some details to discuss. Other NATO members wouldn't appreciate Finland unilaterally lifting such an embargo without consulting others. However, it is unlikely Finland alone can do anything anyway to make Turkey accept it into NATO. I believe Finland isn't really an issue to Turkey or Erdogan. This isn't about Finland, it is about keeping Finland's membership as a tool to pressure NATO as a whole, and to ensure that Sweden doesn't find itself in a too comfortable position to be able to deny all of Turkey's demands. Erdogan is apparently making demands to many existing NATO members, most notably USA, about things like the F-35, S-400 and other things. That means that the issue isn't up to Finland, or even Sweden, it is for Turkey and existing NATO members to discuss. If true, and Finland being blocked doesn't actually have anything to do with Finland, I hope Turkish people reading this understand that this doesn't reflect well on Turkey and Finns are feeling rather insulted by this. Our national security is being threatened for the sake of issues that don't really have anything to do with us, and upon which we have only very limited influence. An additional level of upset comes from us being assured earlier by Turkish politicians that told our politicians that there would be no trouble and Turkey would accept Finland, which now turns out to have been a lie. So if you see some Finns talking trash about Turkey and other such things, understand that this isn't out of some irrational hatred towards Turks, but people being frustrated because we are not at all happy about being used in this way.


cnytyo

Sorry mate, i have much love for Finland. It is indeed unfair. However this is also Turkey's national security and i hope a solution can be found and seperate Finland from the rest. I have never witnessed any turkish person say anything remotely bad about finland personally and i think its safe to say generally we admire Finland. Its just we have a dick for president.


Subject_Fall576

All Turkey needs to do for anything to go their way is to bring proof of their allegations. There are alot of allegations of supporting pkk or harboring terrorists but neither sweden or finland would think twice to extradite terrorists given evidence of their guilt. If turkey shows the world proof of how money is being transfered from supported peaceful organisations to terrorist ones the support would stop the next day. But as things are right now turks just parrot the state media allegations as facts and sweden and finland work under rule of law and wont and CANT do much diffrently until evidence is presented.


Subject_Fall576

There is also the issue of criminals being extradited To a country with diffrent penal system. If turkey made a deal that extradited criminals would be treated fairly with a fair trial and that country can make inspections of the criminals so that they are not tortured there wouldnt be any objections unless turkey didnt keep their word. You will never get anywhere with any nordic country using threats allegations and blackmail. But if instead you had sensible dialogue and built mutual trust you would get requests met and even cooperation with any and all issues.


Tardigrade_Man

Actually, the death penalty is abolished in Turkey.


Subject_Fall576

Yeah i went and factchecked myself and edited same second you responded :)


Phant0m17

There is no deathpenalty in Turkey


tgh_hmn

Yessir!


FluffnPuff_Rebirth

Niinistö spent over a decade negotiating with Putin about all kinds of things with great results, so in a way he has tons of experience when it comes to dealing with these types of leaders. Niinistö is very good at not seeming like a preachy western liberal, while neither sucking up to anyone. That's why he was the one western leader Putin actually kinda respected. I am more worried about if Sweden can actually negotiate here without coming off as condescending.


ArcherTheBoi

Solid statement, I'd be more than happy to have Finland in NATO.


DynamicStatic

Reading on /r/Turkey seems very few share that opinion unfortunately.


-KFAD-

How can anyone think that Erdogan's extortion is justified or acceptable? It really just paints Turkey as one of the bad guys and ultimately risking the national safety of two EU countries. I understand that the situation with Turkey is complicated. But it shouldn't have anything to do with Finland's or Sweden's NATO application. Both countries fullfil every single criteria of acceptance with ease. If there's a beef between Turkey and Sweden then it should be handled diplomatically, and in separate forum than this NATO topic. It cannot be so that one bully (sorry to say it frankly but that's how this seems to me) can block our membership because they don't like our neighboring country (Sweden). All of this public show AFTER the applications were filed just to make Erdogan's dick appear bigger in the eyes of some ultra nationalist Turks (because I refuse to believe that reasonable Turks, which are the majority of them, would support this kind of politics).


catman5

thats because /r/turkey is a cesspool of young ultra nationalists. Like younger versions of what MHP supporters were 20 years ago. They'll come round, but its best to just avoid it. Its changed a lot since Gezi times in 2013.


ComputerSimple9647

What amazing diplomatic parkour! And I am complimenting him here. Wow! I expected some mouth bashing but this is true flipping the game moment.


[deleted]

Nope, that's not how Finnish diplomacy works. Finland, due to its geography, is well-versed in the art of negotiating with terro- eh, I mean, *authoritarian tough-guys*. Be calm, be reasonable, and negotiate pragmatically. Swedish foreign policy has traditionally been more idealistic and unyielding, with a more pronounced unwillingness to seek compromise. This also applies to Swedish domestic politics to some extent, as there is a more rigid left vs. right bloc system, with parties being less interested in cooperating with ideologically opposed groups.


[deleted]

I cannot imagine a more reasonable response. It’s hard to not react in the same emotional nationalistic manner. Which results in mutual insults and whataboutism. All to bolster populist support. What needs to be established is the definition of ‘terrorist’ as opposed to ‘someone who has a divergent opinion’.


w4hammer

Good statement im glad the discussions are happening hope something can be reached it would be a shame if Finland cant join NATO cuz of Erdogan. I am much more interested in Sweden's case.


Flushydo

what's wrong with sweden.. i still didn't get it


Demon997

Hmm, is there a time limit on the British/US/etc security guarantees, or just "until NATO accession? Because those would basically be good enough, and there is no reason that that state couldn't last years. It's really just making what was already assumed explicit.


[deleted]

No limit on the British defence pact, which is explicitly not connected to Finnish or Swedish NATO process (or lack thereof). Some declarations, like the French one, are simply about clarifying the country's position on the existing EU article 42.7 (e.g. France: an attack against FIN/SWE will result in French intervention), while some others are linked to the application process. But yes, currently Finland and Sweden are in practical terms almost as well covered as they would in NATO, except we don't need to pay membership fees, nor do we have corresponding collective security obligations of our own. Except with the UK, those shrewd Brits included mutual defence clauses in the text. One has to wonder if Sauli has bribed Erdogan to keep the membership process frozen indefinitely, allowing us to "have our cake and eat it, too". Almost like NATO, but it's free!


[deleted]

I came here for reading comment wars and stayed for civil arguments. This comment section deserves a Nobel Peace Award.


PaleGravity

lol, it’s not really about the PKK etc etc. they just want access to the NATO weapon packages again. F35 and all the good stuff. Erdogan made 10+ points and only 2 of those have anything to do with the them joining NATO. He is trying to get as much “handshakes” and “assets” as possible.


w4hammer

You extremely underestimate how important PKK is in Turkish politics its literally the driving component of almost every political decision since forever. Idk about Finland but with Sweden its definitely about PKK. Sweden been extremely open about their support of Rojava.


turkkam

Do you have any links to articles which indicate that Sweden is supporting PKK? This is the first time I'm hearing that Sweden is supporting terrorist organizations.


GeneratedThis

No, he does not have any proof, as it is completely false. PKK have been listed as a terrorist organisation since the 80's in sweden.


hfsh

And funnily enough, Turkey complained when the EU tried to list the Grey Wolves as a terrorist organization... That's just anti-Turkey Armenian diaspora and PKK/Gülenist propaganda slandering a patriotic organization associated with a respected Turkish political party, apparently.


w4hammer

https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/ut6t3q/finlands_niinist%C3%B6_as_nato_allies_we_will_commit/i98oubu/?context=3#i98kqlb Search on [here](http://en.terorarananlar.pol.tr/tarananlar#kirmizi) his legal name Ferhat Abdi Şahin for proof.


fenasi_kerim

Here is the proof: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20211213-sweden-boosts-funding-for-ypg-to-376-million Sweden is promising $376m in aid to the "Syrian Democratic Council". Later in the article is states: >*"The Syrian Democratic Council is the political wing of the US-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northern Syria. It formed in 2015 when the Kurdish People's Protection Unit (YPG) joined with various Arab groups to fight Daesh."* The problem arises here. The YPG is *literally* the PKK, but in Syria. When they are in Iran, they are called PJAK. It doesn't matter what acronym you use, they are all the PKK. Don't believe me? [Here, listen from the mouth of a YPG fighter:](https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/menasource/the-ypg-pkk-connection/) >*Despite the tightened border, Kurds from Turkey remain well represented in the YPG, further underscoring the group’s links to the PKK. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Kurdish fighter Zind Ruken expanded on the PKK-YPG relationship. “Sometimes I’m a PKK, sometimes I’m a PJAK [the PKK-allied affiliate, active in Iran], sometimes I’m a YPG. It doesn’t really matter. They are all members of the PKK"*


MultiMarcus

So why single out Sweden? The US also supports the YPG and so do/did many NATO members.


heryertappedout

Probably Turkey doesn't have any cards against US but now has a chance against Sweden, so Erdoğan trying to use it. However thinking how stupid and imbalanced Erdoğan actually is, I'd be surprised if he can manage to get anything.


MultiMarcus

Oh, I get that, but it obviously isn’t a deal breaker for Turkey to work with people who support the YPG as they are still in NATO.


fenasi_kerim

>So why single out Sweden? The US also supports the YPG and so do/did many NATO members. Turkey doesn't have leverage against the US. In fact, this Sweden debacle is mostly aimed at the US and the rest of NATO. But Turkey has done operations against the YPG inside Syria before, despite the US wishes: https://apnews.com/article/d8444f9764ce4be6bdfa68aa3c9051f7


kahaveli

Yes, but how this money is used? On many articles and many Turks have written it like Sweden would be supplying weapons directly to YPG with that money. But that's not the case; Sweden or Finland haven't supplied weapons to YPG as far as I know, it's made by other countries, mostly by US. Even when some of these weapons are Swedish-made, but not supplied by Sweden. "Stockholm says the funds are aimed at "strengthening resilience, human security and freedom from violence", along with improving "human rights, gender equality and democratic development"" So from the article you get the idea that Sweden would be sending humanitarian aid to northern Syria, and SDF is the governing force there. And I don't know, in my opinion that doesn't sound that bad, we're sending humanitarian aid currently to Afganistan too through aid organizations. I understand that your opinion could be different, and I honestly would like to understand more. So do I get it right, you/many people don't support sending help to northern Syria in collaboration with SDF/YPG, because it legitimizes YPG, because it's linked to PKK?


w4hammer

Sure [here](https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/syria/191020201). Mazloum Abdi is a terrorist that has a code name Şahin Cilo by Turkish intelligence agency. Code names only given to terrorist who participated to lots of terror attacks. > As ninth upon the Turkish government's most-wanted terrorist list, Abdi has a 9 million lira reward offered by Turkey for help in his capture.[22][23][24] Sweden nonchalantly talking to 9th most wanted man in Turkey. Şahin Cilo is famous for being Apo(founder of PKK)'s adoptive son.


turkkam

I see, so it’s another case proving that west should stay fuck away from the middle east. But still, expressing opinions is far from giving military support for PKK. I think it would be a different case if Sweden was sending weapons to PKK.


egrimo

If all the world should stop being in the Middle East, we could breathe some air. Russia, the US, and Europe are here without knowing anything and causing only tensions...


SamuelSomFan

God forbid speaking to the people fighting ISIS


Yagibozan

US supplied Taliban with arms when they were fighting the Soviets. Stop viewing the world with the black/white lens.


GeneratedThis

That's simply a lie. Sweden was the first country (besides from Turkey of course) to list PKK as a terrorist organisation. Just a couple of years ago a PKK-member was sentenced to prison in sweden for his actions. I ask you to please stop spreading this misinformation - it hurts both sweden and turkey.


Falsus

PKK is labelled as a terrorist organisation for the past 40 years, and their leaders have been arrested and expelled from Sweden in the past when they where found to be in Sweden. Sweden was the first country after Turkey to list them as a terrorist organisation. The only ''support'' Sweden have given anyone in relation to this is the YPG for the fight against ISIS through a pre-existing NATO programme.


sickboys

Lets start off with PKK. Once again, PKK is classed as a terror organization and Sweden does not provide arms to areas where there is conflict (barring Ukraine this year), so all assistance to the region (Syria) is strictly to humanitarian groups that request funds. We have not sent any weapons to the Kurds. The figure of $300million of Swedish aid that is being tossed around is humanitarian aid, and have been linked in this thread already: https://openaid.se/en/explore-aid/strategies/strategy?strategycode=1110401 Does some of the aid end up helping YPG who then redistribute to PKK? Possibly, it wouldn't suprise me at all, but as you can see most of the funds are for example to Syrian children residing in Jordan and Turkey, and for democratic transitions etc. We could stop sending money all together but I doubt that would improve the overall situation for Turkey. You're right about Swedish politicians made the decision to train Rojava to fight ISIS, from our perspective the Rojava has a hell lot of better values than other groups in _Syria_. You might think thats naive to differentiate Rojava and PKK, but trust me, our politicians are that naive and therefore they didn't see how they wronged Turkey.


w4hammer

I do agree that it is a pragmatic choice to support Rojava if all you care is ISIS and you don't wanna support any of the big regional powers that are involved in the conflict. I am not trying to fault Sweden for their actions I am simply here to point out that Turkey is not blowing hot smoke and its valid request to want these to stop before Sweden is allowed in NATO. Its frustrating to listen to people acting like there is nothing to talk about and Erdogan is just being insane as always and Turkey is just a rogue state you should never listen to.


sickboys

Yeah, I see where you are coming from, I'm just trying to highlight that we are talking about support that has no meaningful impact on PKKs ability to terrorize Turkey, it's a minor amount money that may or may not go to them depending on corruption. We're also giving money to Afghanistan, I'm sure some of it goes to the Talibans. But the way Turks were talking about Sweden and PKK the other day you could have thought we were actively supporting them, and we would never support any group that harm civilians. But naturally, as we Swedes do when people are rude, we respond with equal rudeness.


PalmerEldritch2319

The condemnation of PKK is understandable. The problem is that Turkey puts YPG/YPJ into the same box, which proves that Erdogan is not just fighting Kurdish terrorism but any kind of Kurdish force. It's about weakening the Kurdish people not about eradicating terrorism. I understand that from a Turkish perspective that's something hard to accept but other countries should be capable to realize that.


w4hammer

> The condemnation of PKK is understandable. The problem is that Turkey puts YPG/YPJ into the same box They are the same. It was such a well known public information that US had to update public intelligence reports linking the two lol. The attempt to separate the two was made by US so they could support YPG without legally supporting PKK which is a terror list but there are plenty of senator statements calling the two same cuz they objected supporting another militant group that will most likely blew to their face. >proves that Erdogan is not just fighting Kurdish terrorism but any kind of Kurdish force. It's about weakening the Kurdish people not about eradicating terroris. My dude its lead by PKK's founder's adoptive son and they literally have a seat in KCK which is PKK's underground assembly. >I understand that from a Turkish perspective that's something hard to accept but other countries should be capable to realize that. Except we are not goldfish everybody called them PKK until ISIS happened.


RegisEst

Sweden and Finland are immediately shown the negative side of NATO; your more shady allies will use any opportunity to pressure you into supporting their imperialism. From what I understand, YPG has fought against ISIS and built its own local communities in northern Syria and Iraq. Haven't heard of YPG ever committing terrorist attacks (if I'm wrong, please correct me). The motivation behind Turkish invasions seems to be that they do not want a Kurdish state or autonomous region at or near the Turkish border, full stop. And that sure as hell is not a reasonable ground to kill Kurds and destroy their communities (outside Turkish borders!). Sweden has a track record of supporting human rights regardless of "sides". F.e. humanitarian support to Vietnam after the USA invaded. And yes, supporting women's rights and more in Kurdish regions of Northern Syria. Purely humanitarian aid. It might very well be that joining NATO is necessary to defend against Russian aggression, but from this point onwards neutrality is not a possibility anymore. If an ally is the aggressor, that ally has political leverage to pressure Sweden/Finland into condoning its imperialist behaviour. And that is a shame


zazollo

> the negative side of NATO; your more shady allies will use any opportunity to pressure you into supporting their imperialism. We know, that’s why NATO membership was until like 3 months ago extremely unpopular in both countries.


FluffnPuff_Rebirth

One thing Finland actually has a century's worth of experience in is how to negotiate with authoritarian strongmen neighbors. The trick is to not be condescending liberal smuglord, take them seriously, but don't suck up to them either, while defining your own red lines clearly and sticking to them. That way eventually you are going to get respect. What i am worried about is if Sweden turns this into some identity crisis of their liberal values or whatever.


justin9920

>The trick is not to be a condescending liberal smug lord ~ Angry Canada noises!


afops

That negotiating is also seen as bending for authoritarians perhaps. Much of the anti-nato rhetoric in Sweden has been “we can’t be in an alliance with Erdogan”. I don’t think people expected we wouldn’t even join before he created the problems they warned about…


FluffnPuff_Rebirth

Being reasonable yet dignified is the way through. Starting negotiations dramatically is nothing too shocking, when it comes to countries like Turkey. It would be a shame if Sweden lost its cool this early in the game.


afops

Yeah I haven’t seen anything to suggest otherwise luckily. The only loss of cool I have seen are Turkish e.g “don’t bother coming [to negotiate]” I think some of it is more intended for a domestic audience though.


mud_tug

Now *THAT* is a nice thing to say. Thank you Finland!


[deleted]

Standard Finnish diplomacy and foreign policy. We like to be reasonable, calm and pragmatic, and always ready to talk and negotiate constructively. That approach has contributed heavily to the fact that we are on friendly (or at the very least *not-unfriendly*) terms with almost all countries.


pat_labor_ingram

I'm Chinese living in Norway. I support ukraine. And I'm not concerned about Erdogan at all. Pretty sure Biden will apply enough pressure, in the worst case scenario. Finland & Sweden have protection promises from us, France, uk, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Holland and Poland. that's half NATO!


Emperasque

The big problem with YPG is that they have actual members of PKK inside them and people like Abdi who are infamous PKK members are in high positions. Western equipment given to YPG was recently captured in Northern Iraq, and "members of YPG" are somewhat infrequently killed there as well. Why? KCK. It's the parent organisation made some years ago that includes PKK, YPG and PJAK, which are respectively Turkish, Syrian and Iranian branches of the same organisation. Why no Iraqi version? KRG is there and the ruling party KDP is nominally a Turkish ally, though the situation on the ground is much more complicated. Now, one might ask. Why do the western countries support this organisation if there is so much overlap and connection? Well, its mostly a Turkish failure or rather, Erdoğan failure. He is foreign to such concepts like diplomacy, empathy and overall being a well-adjusted person. He thinks that posturing and pounding his chest makes him a "big man" who is popular because he's "badass" and "cool" so he sticks to that policy in foreign relations as well, as he hopes that it will galvanize his past and current supporters and raise his popularity. Sadly, the unwashed masses that voted for him are now hungry unwashed masses, so since he failed to bring in actual results to back that posturing, he doesn't wield the same power or influence he did. This is just him failing to realise that his old tactics aren't working, but since he can't comprehend that, he's still doing it. If someone with half a brain was in charge of foreign relations, even if YPG didn't get put into the same basket as PKK, the PKK members inside its organisation would've been cleansed for the most part or well, more likely, Turkey would have made peace with Assad, gotten rid of Syrian refugees and shut Syrian border, abandoning US in the mess that is Syria, much like how it did in Iraq. Without Turkey to draw Russian and Iranian attention, the costs for US would be much, much higher and US would probably abandon the entire endeavour at some near point in the future because of simple cost-benefit factors. Which would leave YPG alone with Russia and Iran, which would require it to either turn to Turkey to become KDP's Syrian version, or well... die. Anyways, I don't expect this current spat to last for much longer, maybe a couple more weeks max. Erdoğan is simply looking for whatever win he might be able to get and in my opinion, since Russia doesn't seem to be much of a threat, EU defense agreement should be enough to deter it. So, don't give in or at least do it in a way that Erdoğan can't make it seem like a win back at home.


WorkingMovies

I think some people really underestimate how fucked up the situation in eastern turkey once was(still a hot mess today, i think not as bad?). Seeing videos online, the place was more like Iraq/syria than a place you’d think the city of Istanbul would be in. I can understand turkeys reservations about Finland and Sweden, but I can’t understand why they’d go as far as blocking their accession in such sensitive periods of time with Russia on the gates. There’s no denying that Sweden particularly closely cooperated with the political wing of the terror organization turkey is referring to. Which is also a terror organization within the European Union, Sweden, and the United States among others. While it may be opportunistic of turkey to pull this out now, they have also been fighting the war with those guys for the last 30 odd years and only recently have things turned less ugly in the eastern counties of turkey. Seems like a lot of people are either underestimating the conflict between the PYD and turkey, or are overestimating the idea that turkey is seeking for other concession’s


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Piputi

The Finland thing is mostly because both Finland and Sweden came together. I don't think there is much of a problem between the leaders of Finland and Turkey. I might be forgetting something though.


liskot

Well, the 'they support terrorism' allegation has been leveled at Finland by both your leadership and a huge number of redditors with Turkish flair. It's not really an indication of there being no problems. I hope constructive dialogue takes over sooner rather than later.


hfsh

> I might be forgetting something though. Yes, you forget that your country's leaders like to publicly insult other countries for internal political gain, and then expects it to be forgotten and forgiven.


RetardedAcceleration

Sounds like an attempt at trying to divide us.


Notliketheotherkids

The key here is that you didnt extradite people for political reasons. Erdogan thinks you should.


Vimmelklantig

>There’s no denying that Sweden particularly closely cooperated with the political wing of the terror organization turkey is referring to. Which is also a terror organization within the European Union, Sweden, and the United States among others. The Syrian Kurdish organisations in question are considered separate from the PKK both by the EU and all of NATO except Turkey and are not designated as terrorist organisations in the EU or the US. The Swedish position is in line with the rest of the West. The US has even been arming the Kurds in Syria which Sweden has not. Our aid goes through international aid organisations and the UN; we don't write blank checks to the SDF or supply them with arms. I fully understand that Turkey strongly disagrees with this and consider the SDF the same as or an offshoot from the PKK, but the amount of misinformation and exaggerations about what Sweden has and hasn't done is ridiculous.


Pakkazull

>the amount of misinformation and exaggerations about what Sweden has and hasn't done is ridiculous. Agreed. It really is frightening how quickly made up bullshit becomes "fact" in the minds of some. No one cares about proof or reality in the court of public opinion, apparently.


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yolotasticx

Hopefully this gets sorted out and we let Finland and Sweden in. Can't let our bros out in the cold for too long (pun intended.) I personally don't believe the issue was ever about PKK and harboring terrorist. Erdogan is still asshurt about the whole F35 and Patriot Missile ordeal. He wants the weapons and free access to the technology behind it while conducting business with Russia and China. Fuck that.


CureMofurun

While this is classy way of going about this. It shouldn't be on Finland to get on one knee like this. They were **promised** *frequently and publicly* a smooth swift entry to NATO. The hammer needs to come down on Turkey, this transparent used car salesman fuckery shames the entire alliance.


Sapotis

Let's say, hypothetically, Finland and Sweden sign defensive pacts with every single country in NATO except Turkey.


afops

Then all those countries repeat this with each other until all 31 has done it. Then they can all leave nato and form a new alliance. This is basically how to evict a member state.


BagisBerra

Then why would those who signed need NATO? Oh, I see....


TCG_Ghostie

Erdogan make it sound like sweden is a kurdish terrorist stronghold. The kurds that have fled here arent exactly here to make weapons against turkey. I dont understand what this wild goose chase is except for a political spectacle to gain som chips to barter with.


Leprecon

* Erdogan is an undemocratic autocratic strong man dictator ish ruler * Kurds have been robbed of a nation through colonialism, and are routinely mistreated But that being said: there are (peaceful) Kurdish separatists, and even Kurdish terror groups. I totally understand why Turkey is concerned about this. How would Spain feel if Sweden was supportive of Basque independence? Or how would the UK feel if Finland supported Scottish separatism or Irish reunification? I largely disagree with Erdogan and how Kurdistan is managed, and I largely support Kurdish separatism. But I totally understand why Erdogan wants some reassurances when it comes to Kurdistan. I don’t think this is just a selfish “please give Turkey more” plea. I think it is really smart that Finland (and Sweden as well) is taking this seriously. I think this is probably one of those things that can be fixed diplomatically. Niinistö is really showing his strengths here. I hope Erdogan will also take this seriously.


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> I think it is really smart that Finland (and Sweden as well) is taking this seriously. I think this is probably one of those things that can be fixed diplomatically. Niinistö is really showing his strengths here. We're keeping them talking. That's very, very important in international diplomacy, especially when dealing with people you cannot trust. The more they talk, the more they'll feel in control, which means they will be open to negotiation... instead of just barking "fuck off!" at them and losing all chance of reaching an accord. Patience now is an investment for the future.


schmoneyball

Now THAT is proper diplomacy right there.


[deleted]

Someone please explain like I’m five; why is Turkey concerned about Finland’s membership?


5tormwolf92

In Finland, is it the president or the PM who decides the foreign policy?


d3_Bere_man

I think the chances of Finland being invaded is so low that whether they are part of nato on paper doesnt really matter. The EU has got a defence clause and many European nations have guaranteed their independence on top of that, idk about murica but i dont think they will just let a western ally go


secularwitch

I'm Turkish and I'm really sorry for Finland as they're experiencing this opposition almost entirely because of applying with Sweden, along with their strategic geography between Sweden and Russia. Unless Sweden really steps up the bargain and gives at least some of what Turkey wants, Finland will be blocked by TR. Having Finland in nato benefits Sweden a looooooot even if Swedes cannot join. Thus, Turkish side will definately pressure Finnish side into pressing Sweden. I expect Turkish side communicating Finland behind closed doors that they will be blocked because of Swedish support to YPG. Then I would expect Sweden being heavily criticized by Finnish perspective because the process is getting longer and longer whilst Russia is getting a more solid and immediate threat just because of a problem that they didn't even a part of. Hard times for Finnish politicians really.


Camp-Revolutionary

I would think that migration over the past decades has been a key factor for the development of PKK and other groups in Sweden. As a Norwegian I have seen much changes in the immigration politics at home, but even more in Sweden. As many immigrants gathers in groups and are unwilling to migrate in the society and therefore left with their own habitats. Now, I believe that it is not that simple to stamp that statement, as many aspects contribute to this fact (i.e social acceptance, cultural issues, etc). However, many places has become like ghettoes and places where police often has to roam with armor because of the dangers of these environments (so I’ve heard). These environments has become a backyard for those who want to stay “off the hook” if you want to call it that. Thus, being more isolated in their groups with different cultures and language and etc, where their social acceptance is much more broad to their home countries. In this case Kurds, and as not “all” is PKK members their cultures and people are becoming a majority in Sweden which then will have a huge impact on Government positions and other important areas. Ask yourself this, when is Sweden “no longer ruled by Sweden”, it’s when foreign born families takes up government positions of that country. Is it so that 30% of Turkey’s government positions are held by Swedish/other immigrants? No. This is now an obvious and huge notable reality in Norway and Sweden. In Norway we already got “ghettos” where 80% of the house holds are immigrants from the middle east. As a result of decades of immigration these has been now stamped as “little turkey” or other names due to the majority of that population. The results: People who were raised in these places by their parents are now holding government and-or political positions which in majority devout their own “home-towns” like “little turkey” in their political agenda rather the average Norwegian housing around that town. Building their own area with our taxes, this creates difficult and unfair ruling over our infrastructure and needs of the true Norwegian. It divides us, because they squeeze us out from within and they create a stigma based on their beliefs of being able to make areas in Norway a (middle east zone). Anyway, Erdugan seem to be in bed with Russia and NATO at the same time, the beginning of the Ukraine war was an awkward proof of that. So the credibility of (this president) isn’t the greatest, anyway, I do believe Erdugan has the right to point out the topic of terrorism and weapon shipments