Letter to the editor

Dear Mr Papachelas,

I am a frequent reader of your columns, and appreciate very much your well-thought-out and well-formulated texts, which I find very interesting and useful.

However, your article titled “The bargain in Madrid” contained some errors that I would like to bring to your attention.

Neither Finland nor Sweden agreed to change their legislation (regarding the Kurds or any other aspect) as a result of the negotiation and agreement with Turkey. Nor did the countries lift the arms embargo, simply because such embargoes do not exist at the moment.

The commitments of Finland, Sweden and Turkey are detailed in the memorandum of understanding signed as a result of the negotiation. The above issues do not appear in the agreement, and there are no other agreements on these topics between the countries.

The claims on legislation changes and lifting an arms embargo have been made by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his administration only. Repeating such claims unfortunately only serves the interest of the current Turkish administration – whatever those interests might be.

Kind regards,

Tero Mäkelä