The turning point during negotiations with Turkey to resolve disagreements on the entry of Finland and Sweden in NATO was a coffee break, said the Foreign Minister of Finland Pekka Haavisto in an interview with the Spanish newspaper El Mundo.
According to the Finnish minister, the agreement signed with Ankara is a success. “We were negotiating for a long time, and there were many different text options,” the minister explained. “We had people who were negotiating in Ankara, there were several meetings in Brussels.” “Honestly, I did not expect that we could solve this in Madrid, because there were many open issues,” he added, statements by the Finnish minister quoted TASS.
Haavisto assumes that “a turning point was a break on coffee. The sides sat for two hours, repeating the same phrases, but during the coffee break we found creative ideas and were able to change the text to find a general solution.”
“This is rather a political declaration than a legal agreement, he added.” We do not need to change our legislation, and everything will be done in accordance with our existing laws. ” “The key point is to strengthen cooperation, we are ready to receive information from the Turkish authorities and cooperate in matters related to terrorism. But all decisions are made in accordance with Finnish legislation,” said the Foreign Minister.
Finland and Sweden on May 18 submitted applications for joining NATO. As expected, they had to receive an invitation to enter the alliance summit in Madrid, but Turkish veto blocked this process. As a result, on June 28, negotiations between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President Finland Sauli Ninisty, Prime Minister of Sweden Magdalena Andersson and Secretary General of NATO Jens Stoltenberg, who initiated the initiator of their holding were held. According to their results, a memorandum was signed, allowing Stockholm and Helsinki to enter NATO and taking into account concerns expressed by Ankara regarding the sale of weapons and the fight against terrorism.