Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1469338
13 maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 1 JUNE 2022 OPINION Ronald Suny Professor of History and Political Science, University of Michigan AFTER decades of neutrali- ty, the two Nordic states that have to date remained out of the North Atlantic Treaty Or- ganization have reacted to Russia's invasion of Ukraine by declaring an intention to join the American-led alliance. But there is a major obstacle in their way: Turkey. The increasingly autocrat- ic and anti-democratic presi- dent of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has said he will not agree to the entry of these two countries. And as a member of NATO, Turkey's approval is needed for Finland and Sweden to join. Erdogan is alone among NA- TO leaders in publicly stating that he is against the two coun- tries' joining the alliance. Harboring terrorists or grudg- es? The Turkish president's op- position is based on his view that Finland and Sweden sup- port "terrorists." What Erdogan means is that both countries have given pro- tection and residence to mem- bers of the Kurdistan Work- ers' Party, or PKK – the major armed group mounting resist- ance to Turkey's harsh treat- ment of its millions of Kurdish citizens. The plight of the country's Kurds, part of a large but state- less ethnic group in the region, has long been a bone of conten- tion between Turkey and parts of the international communi- ty. Despite the PKK's being listed by the U.S. and EU as a terror- ist group, Finland and Sweden have been reluctant to extra- dite members of the group to Turkey over human rights con- cerns. Erdogan has responded by calling Sweden a "hatchery" for terrorism and claiming nei- ther country has "a clear, open attitude" toward terrorist or- ganizations, adding: "How can we trust them?" Erdoğan's ire with Finland and Sweden has also been ex- acerbated by the country host- ing followers of Turkish schol- ar and cleric Fethullah Gulen. These followers are part of an educational and political move- ment with which Erdogan had been allied, but with which he broke as it grew more powerful. The Turkish president accuses the Gulenists of staging a failed coup against his government in 2016. All international politics is local As if that were not enough, the neutral northern Europe- ans condemned Turkey's 2019 incursion into Syria. In that operation, the Turks targeted Rojava – a socialist, feminist autonomous Kurdish enclave near the Turkish border. Com- plicating the matter, the Syr- ians of Rojava were – despite their links to the PKK – allies of the American forces. The Kurds of Rojava played a crucial role beating back the Islamic State group in Syria but were later abandoned by the Trump administration, which pulled U.S. troops back from the Turkish border, al- lowing its NATO ally to launch a military operation against the Kurds. Foreign policy is almost al- ways intimately tied to do- mestic concerns. In the case of Turkey's government, a major fear is the threat to its grip on power posed by the Kurds – and international pressure over Turkey's record of repressing the group. Turkey's Kurdish populations are not allowed free elections in the eastern Anatolian re- gion, where they are the ma- jority. Meanwhile, education and cultural institutions in the Kurdish language face a de fac- to ban. The path ahead for NATO Finland and Sweden are neu- tral countries not beholden to the strategic compromises that the United States and NATO are forced to make to hold the alliance together. Both coun- tries have to date been free to take a moral position on Tur- key's position on Kurdish rights and have officially protested the repressions of dissidents, aca- demics, journalists and minor- ity groups. Meanwhile, NATO countries have equivocated before their fellow member, agreeing to la- bel the PKK a terrorist organi- zation. So where does this all leave Finland and Sweden's applica- tion for NATO membership? The rules for entry into the strategic alliance require una- nimity of the current NATO members. As such, Turkey can effective- ly veto the entry of Finland and Sweden. The standoff highlights an un- derlying problem the alliance is facing. NATO is supposed to be an alliance of democratic coun- tries. Yet several of its members – notably Turkey and Hunga- ry – have moved steadily away from liberal democracy toward ethnonational populist authori- tarianism. Finland and Sweden, on the other hand, fulfill the param- eters of NATO membership more clearly than several of the alliance's current members. As the United States proclaims that the war in Ukraine is a struggle between democracy and autoc- racy, Turkey's opposition to the Nordics who have protested its drift to illiberalism are testing the unity and the ideological coherence of NATO. Why Turkey isn't on board with Finland, Sweden joining NATO – and why that matters