Erdogan aide: Turkey “not in a position” to ratify Sweden’s NATO bid
ISTANBUL — Turkey said on Saturday that it is “not in a position” to ratify Sweden’s NATO membership, despite a series of measures taken by Stockholm to meet Ankara’s demands.
“We are not in a position to send one [ratification] law to parliament,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s foreign policy adviser Ibrahim Kalin told reporters.
Sweden and its Nordic neighbor Finland shed decades of military non-alignment and applied to join the Western defense alliance in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year.
Turkey and Hungary remain the only NATO members that have still not ratified the bids through parliamentary votes.
Ankara claims that Sweden in particular has failed to fulfill a series of commitments both countries made at a NATO summit in June.
Erdogan then raised his objections to their applications in exchange for promises to crack down on Kurdish groups Ankara sees as terrorists.
Sweden has since approved a constitutional amendment that will make it possible to adopt tougher anti-terror laws.
But Kalin said it will take at least until June for Sweden’s parliament to vote on the measures, and that Ankara will wait for all Swedish legislation to pass before acting.
“It will take [Sweden] about six months to write and pass the new laws,” Kalin said. “They’re going to need a little more time.”