NATO chief on his way to Turkey over Finland, Sweden membership
NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said on Wednesday that he would go to Turkey “in the near future” to discuss Finland and Sweden’s nearly completed process to join the military alliance.
The trip to meet the president Recep Tayyip Erdogan will be sensitive, as Turkey, along with Hungary, is the last of NATO’s 30 countries to ratify the accession protocol that would make Finland and Sweden new members.
The process must be unanimous. But Erdogan, in early October, warned that his country would not ratify the two countries’ membership until the “promises” they made were kept.
The two Nordic countries earlier this year scrapped their long-standing non-alignment policy and asked to join NATO because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and how it messed about Europe’s security.
In June, Turkey, Sweden and Finland concluded an agreement that contained provisions on the release and exchange of information.
It addressed Erdogan’s main demands that Finland and Sweden stop hosting Kurdish militants banned in Turkey and whom he considers “terrorists” and hand over Kurds wanted by Ankara.
Stoltenberg, speaking at a media conference after welcoming Romania’s prime minister to NATO headquarters, hailed the “close contact” Stockholm and Helsinki now had with Ankara “at all levels”.
He said: “I myself will go to… Istanbul to meet President Erdogan in the near future”.
It would follow a visit by the new Swedish prime minister Ulf Kristersson will do in the coming days.
Stoltenberg also said Hungary “has made it clear” that its parliament will vote on the ratification of the accession protocols for Finland and Sweden in the next month or so.
“I am confident that all allies will ratify the Accession Protocol,” he said.
The NATO chief added, in a veiled warning to Russia, that security guarantees extended to Finland and Sweden pending their membership process continued to apply.
“If there were any kind of pressure on Finland and Sweden, it is unthinkable that NATO allies should just stand by and not react. So we will react if there is any kind of pressure on Finland and Sweden, he says.