NATO strives to make progress on Finland, Sweden’s membership
ANKARA
The head of NATO said on Monday that they aim to “make progress” in Finland and Sweden’s membership applications ahead of the Madrid summit.
“We also aim to make progress on Finland’s and Sweden’s historic applications for NATO membership, while ensuring that security concerns for all Allies are addressed. I spoke with (Turkish) President (Recep Tayyip) Erdogan last Saturday, and I will meet (Swedish Prime Minister (Magdalena) Andersson later today, said Jens Stoltenberg at a press conference before the summit in Brussels.
Stoltenberg said that NATO must “take into account the concerns expressed by the Allies, in this case by Turkey. And that is also the reason why we have intensified the dialogue with our ally and with Finland, Sweden in recent weeks.”
Finnish and Swedish leaders will meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Madrid on Tuesday, NATO Secretary General said. The four-way meeting, which will also include Stoltenberg, will be preceded by “another meeting with senior officials from all three countries” at NATO headquarters on Monday.
“Our NATO summit in Madrid will be transformative with many important decisions, including on the new strategic concept for a new security reality,” he said.
Stoltenberg said that NATO “will transform NATO’s response force and increase the number of our contingency forces to well over 300,000.”
NATO leaders will meet in Madrid to discuss what could be its biggest military operation since the end of the Cold War.
The summit will run from Tuesday to Thursday, with talks expected to focus on NATO’s response to the war in Ukraine, and the Finnish and Swedish petitions to join the 30-member military alliance.
Sweden, together with Finland, formally applied to join NATO last month, a decision spurred on by Russia’s war against Ukraine, which began on 24 February.
But Türkiye, a longtime member of the alliance, has objected to the membership offers and criticized the countries for tolerating and even supporting the terrorist groups.
In its more than 35-year-old terrorist campaign against Turkey, the PKK – listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union – has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 people.
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