ASSURANCES
Blinken’s go to was performed down by Turkish officers and few rapid particulars have been disclosed.
Turkish state media launched an official picture of Blinken shacking Erdogan’s hand at one of many Turkish chief’s Istanbul residences.
The Turkish international ministry issued a two line assertion saying Blinken and counterpart Hakan Fidan mentioned “the humanitarian disaster in Gaza, Sweden’s NATO accession course of, bilateral and regional points”.
Blinken will hope to win assurances {that a} ratification vote on Sweden’s accession to NATO shall be held quickly by Türkiye’s parliament.
Erdogan has been in a position to make use of Türkiye’s veto energy to impel Sweden into taking a harder stance with Kurdish teams in Stockholm that Ankara views as “terrorists”.
He has additionally been making an attempt to make Sweden’s approval conditional on the US delivering 40 US F-16 fighters jets and practically 80 modernisation kits for Türkiye’s ageing air drive.
Biden’s administration formally backs the sale.
However has been unable to beat resistance in Congress from lawmakers who categorical alarm about Türkiye’s place on Sweden and previous navy standoffs with historic rival Greece.
Blinken was to journey to the Greek island of Crete later Saturday for talks with Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
Athens has fiercely resisted the US jet gross sales due to longstanding territorial disputes with Türkiye within the energy-rich japanese Mediterranean area.
Greece is searching for to buy a batch of extra superior F-35 jets from the US to counter the perceived Turkish menace.
