[Dargo]

The Turkish president can sell the agreement with Sweden and Finland as a victory at home. Have Sweden and Finland made significant concessions? 'Turkey got what it asked for,' writes the newspaper Milliyet. The Sabah newspaper talks about President Erdoğan's 'Victory in Madrid'. This already indicates that the supposed success radiates mainly to the president himself. He can use it well. He hopes to be re-elected next June, but his AK Party is in a bad way in the polls. The ailing economy does not exactly please the Turkish electorate. With his leading role in Madrid, he can present himself as the statesman who stands up for the interests of Turkey and who is taken into account on the international stage.

The text of the agreement is cleverly and carefully worded, in such a way that the parties involved can still do anything with it. The Turks can therefore give it their glorious twist, but in a concrete sense the result is especially convenient for the Swedes and Finns. After all, Ankara demanded concessions from them, measures that in part could even be in conflict with their own legislation and with the European human rights treaty. There will be no more of that now. For example, the two countries promise to process Turkish requests for the extradition of terror suspects 'quickly and thoroughly', but that in itself is an open door: of course the judiciary takes its work seriously. No promises have been made about the actual deportation of specific individuals. The same goes for "taking seriously Turkey's concerns" about terrorism. Also, an open door. The Kurdish PKK was already on the list of terrorist organizations in the European Union. The Kurdish-Syrian militia YPG is not explicitly labelled as terrorist in the text. Sweden and Finland do promise not to support the YPG, but they did not do so anyway, at least not militarily. The most concrete concession is to lift the arms embargo against Turkey, but that was largely symbolic.

Turkey is mostly about perception. They have received black-on-white international recognition of their concerns about what they sincerely see as their most important security issue, the PKK. That should not be underestimated. In addition, like so much in Turkey, it is also about the person Erdoğan. He felt disrespected by Joe Biden, who had not contacted him about NATO expansion. Now he did call, and in Madrid the two men spoke. 'Erdoğan wants a personal relationship with leaders,' says Jenny White of Stockholm University's Institute for Turkey Studies. 'The meeting with Biden is a big blow he's landed. And TV images of Erdoğan surrounded by journalists: that's exactly what he wants. A rock star.' Turkey probably didn't want to be seen as the ones who had defeated NATO expansion. They were also hoping, according to White, to get the green light from Russia for a military operation against the Kurds in northern Syria. But Moscow didn't give that, so there was no more to be gained there either. Of the Kurds in Turkey, a large proportion, sometimes almost half, have always voted for Erdoğan's AK Party. These Kurds hate the PKK, so they will have no problem with the agreement. The PKK as an armed movement is dying in Turkey, there will be no change in that either.

What the agreement means for the Kurds in northern Syria is the question. Until now, they have received political and humanitarian support, particularly from Stockholm. Swedish ministers spoke several times with leaders of the YPG and its political branch, the PYD. Such a thing will be difficult from now on. Other European countries may also want to be extra careful in their contacts with the PYD. The consequences for Kurds in Sweden and Finland are also uncertain. The agreement refers to "organizations affiliated with the PKK. These are especially active in Sweden, often under a "cultural" label. Their meetings often feature PKK flags and portraits of PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan. It is possible that the Swedish and Finnish authorities will exercise stricter control, but the agreement with Turkey does not explicitly mention this.