Mark Rutte convinced Erdogan to support him for NATO leadership / Who else could Klaus Iohannis rely on

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte secured Turkey’s support for his candidacy for the post of NATO Secretary General after meeting with Turkish President Recep Erdogan on Friday, NOS, the Dutch broadcasting company, and the Dutch news agency ANP reported on Monday, carried by Reuters.

UPDATE: The information was later confirmed by a senior Turkish official, who said Ankara had notified its alliance partners of the decision, according to Reuters and the Associated Press.

“We announced it today in Brussels”, where the NATO headquarters is located, said the spokesperson of the Turkish MFA

Turkey was one of the 3 NATO member countries that had not announced their support for Rutte. The other two are Hungary and Slovakia. Turkey has the second largest army in NATO, surpassed only by the United States.

The Dutch daily NL Times writes that the US wanted Rutte to be approved for the position by now, but that supporters of the Dutch prime minister believe that an agreement on this could be reached before the meeting of the foreign ministers of the NATO member countries which will take place in end of May in Prague.

Mark Rutte courted Erdogan in Ankara

A decision announced in Prague would mean that NATO’s next secretary general could be announced at the alliance’s summit in July in Washington.

NATO’s southern flank “needs Turkey and its leadership,” Rutte said last Friday in Ankara, also describing the Erdogan-led country as an influential player in the region and a geopolitical power.

The Associated Press notes that Rutte visited Turkey with the express purpose of gaining Erdogan’s support, his visit unrelated to his duties as prime minister of the Netherlands.

“No one should have any doubt that we will make our decision based on strategic wisdom and fairness,” Erdogan said.

Rutte’s trip to Ankara took place just two days after President Klaus Iohannis received Cevdet Yılmaz, the Vice President of Turkey, in Bucharest, according to the agenda published by the Presidential Administration.

Rutte relies on the support of the most powerful NATO countries

We remind you that the United States, Great Britain, Germany and France announced on February 22, in what appeared to be a concerted diplomatic action, that they would support Rutte for the position of Secretary General of NATO, but in the evening of the same day the information appeared that President Klaus Iohannis has told the US that he wants the job.

The information was initially published on “X”, the former Twitter social network, by Bloomberg’s correspondent for the White House, Jennifer Jacobs, who reported that Romania has notified NATO allies that it intends to propose Klaus Iohannis as secretary general of Alliance. The information was confirmed on the same day by political sources from Bucharest.

Klaus Iohannis officially announced on March 12 that he is running for the position of Secretary General of NATO from Romania.

According to diplomatic sources, at that time Rutte had not secured the support of the Baltic states, Hungary, Slovakia and Turkey. But the Baltic countries later announced that they would support the Dutch candidate, with public announcements to this effect being made in early April by Sweden, NATO’s newest member, and Italy.

Who else could Klaus Iohannis rely on? Hungary

But Hungary has threatened to use its veto to block a possible election of Rutte as the head of the alliance. “We cannot support the election as Secretary General of NATO of a person who wanted to bring Hungary to its knees,” said Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto, on March 6.

He was referring to a statement by Rutte related to the ongoing dispute between Brussels and Budapest over a new law by which Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban says he wants to ban homosexual propaganda in schools, especially actions of this kind by NGOs. , a law that the European Commission and Western European politicians consider discriminatory towards LGBT people.

Hungary “no longer has anything to look for in the European Union”, and this country must be “brought to its knees”, declared Rutte in June 2021 at a European summit then dominated by this dispute.

Szijjarto also said earlier this month that Hungary maintains its veto over Rutte’s candidacy and hinted that it might back Klaus Iohannis for the job.

“The situation is that in the entire history of NATO, so far it has not happened that the Secretary General was elected from a member state from Central or Eastern Europe, although for 20 or 25 years, most of the countries from Central and Eastern Europe have been members NATO”, emphasized Szijjarto on April 4. “That’s why I think it’s time to think seriously about this idea,” the Hungarian official added at the time.

…and Slovakia

On the same day, Slovakia also signaled that it could support the candidacy of the Romanian president.

“Slovakia is serious about approaching the topic of the future head of NATO and I expected more openness, empathy, from the member states, towards the requests of the countries in the eastern zone because these countries are most exposed to the conflict in Ukraine “, said Juraj Blanar, the Slovak foreign minister, at the time.

In this sense, the Slovak diplomat specified that there was no “reasonable candidate” until the announcement of Klaus Iohannis.

“We expected much more to be discussed about our interests. We did not have a reasonable candidate until Mr. Iohannis presented his candidacy. It is a legitimate candidacy. Our position is very clear. We want to hear how both candidates want to protect our security interests”, explained the head of diplomacy from Bratislava.

Obviously, the Romanian president can also rely on the support of the government in Bucharest.

What the foreign press writes about Iohannis’ candidacy: “It divides the Alliance”

Also on April 4, before the last summit of NATO foreign ministers, the Financial Times wrote, citing diplomatic sources familiar with the situation, that Iohannis is not considered a genuine alternative to Rutte’s candidacy, by almost all members of the Alliance, which, according to diplomatic sources, it will increase the pressure “on the four” to support the Dutch prime minister in the name of alliance unity.

By the four, FT was referring to Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia and Romania.

Just a day before, the French daily Le Figaro noted that the president of Romania “does not have the slightest chance of success, not even among the countries on the eastern flank.”

Le Figaro also quoted a source it described as “a good connoisseur of NATO”, who said that “the way he made the announcement, the timing chosen and the lack of communication with the partners show that Klaus Iohannis did not understand nothing and that he does not have the necessary qualities for this position”.

The candidacy of the President of Romania has been criticized since March, including by the German press. The daily newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) noted on March 13 that he is “dividing the Alliance” with his candidacy.

“It divides the Alliance at a time when we cannot afford this,” a diplomat told FAZ.

FAZ also noted that Klaus Iohannis has no chance of becoming the next Secretary General of NATO and that, instead, the candidacy postpones a decision on the choice of Mark Rutte as Jens Stoltenberg’s successor.