2023-07-11 02:51:27
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan agreed on Monday to forward Sweden’s proposal to join the NATO military alliance to parliament, appearing to end months of drama over an issue that has crippled the bloc as war raged in Ukraine.
Sweden and Finland applied for NATO membership last year, abandoning their decades-long Cold War policies of military non-alignment in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Although Finland’s NATO membership was given the go-ahead in April, Turkey and Hungary have yet to approve Sweden’s candidacy. Stockholm has been working to join the bloc at the alliance’s summit in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, which starts on Tuesday.
“I am pleased to announce… that President Erdogan has agreed to forward Sweden’s accession protocol to the grand national assembly as soon as possible and to work closely with the assembly to secure ratification,” said NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, at a press conference, describing the decision as a “historic” step.
He had summoned Erdogan and Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson to several hours of talks on the eve of the summit as he tried to finally break the deadlock.
Erdogan resisted for months, saying Sweden’s accession depended on implementing a deal reached last year at the alliance’s summit in Madrid and that no one should expect concessions from Ankara.
Turkey accused Sweden of not doing enough against people Turkey views as terrorists, most notably members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is considered a terrorist organization by Turkey, the EU and the United States.
By Sabine Siebold and John Irish, Additional reporting by Niklas Pollard, Andrius Sytas and Justyna Pawlak in Vilnius, Anna Ringstrom and Johan Ahlander in Stockholm and Ezgi Erkoyun in Istanbul
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