Turkey, Sweden, Finland discuss ensuring implementation of Trilateral Memorandum

A second meeting of the permanent joint mechanism between Turkey, Finland and Sweden was held Friday in Stockholm.

The trio signed a trilateral memorandum June 28 at the NATO summit in Madrid to address Turkey’s legitimate security concerns, paving the way for Finland and Sweden’s NATO membership.

The aim of the meeting was to ensure the implementation of commitments in the Trilateral Memorandum.

Finland and Sweden extend their full support to Turkey against threats to its national security, according to the memorandum. To that effect, Helsinki and Finland will not provide support to terror organizations, namely the YPG/PYD and FETO.

The Turkish delegation included presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin, Sedat Onal, the Turkish deputy foreign minister and officials from other ministries.

The Swedish delegation was headed by Ambassador in the Prime Minister's Office Oscar Stenstrom and State Secretary Jan Knutsson.

The Finnish delegation was headed by Permanent State Secretary at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs Jukka Salovaara and Petri Hakkarainen, Director of Foreign and Security Policy in the Office of the President of Finland.

They were joined by representatives from the foreign, justice, police, security and intelligence agencies.

The Permanent Joint Mechanism welcomed the intensified cooperation at the technical level among relevant ministries and institutions and the progress achieved by Finland and Sweden in compliance with the memorandum. They decided to continue working further on its implementation.

Turkey, a NATO member for more than 70 years, made it clear that it will oppose the Nordic countries' NATO membership if its security concerns have not been met

The first meeting of the Permanent Joint Mechanism established under the memorandum was held Aug. 26 in Vantaa, Finland.