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Turkey wants to support Sweden’s NATO membership. SRF correspondent Sebastian Ramspeck on the reasons for the Turkish change of opinion.
Turkey has given up its opposition to Sweden joining NATO. Turkey has thus completed a U-turn, as the Turkish leadership has been blocking Sweden’s accession for a good year. She pointed out that the Scandinavian country was not taking sufficient action against “terrorist organizations” – she was primarily concerned with the banned Kurdish Workers’ Party PKK.
The fact that at the end of June, for the first time in months, a Koran was set on fire at a demonstration in Stockholm, recently put additional strain on relations with Ankara.
hardened fronts
“This week the fronts seemed hardened,” says SRF correspondent Sebastian Ramspeck in Vilnius. “One had the impression that it would not be possible to reach an agreement at this NATO summit. Things seem to have gotten moving in the last few hours, »says Ramspeck.
“When the agreement was announced, it was said that agreement had now been reached on the implementation of the terrorist measures, which had already been approved in principle last year,” said Ramspeck. “What exactly changed there remained very vague. For example, you want to hold regular meetings. In the end it seemed to be a deal that actually didn’t change that much, but Erdogan seems to have given in.”
Türkiye-EU rapprochement
Something also seems to have happened with regard to linking NATO accession to Turkey’s EU accession. “NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said at the media conference that it is probably the case that Sweden has committed itself to fighting for a rapprochement with Turkey within the EU, for example on the visa issue, so that Turkish citizens can enter the EU without a visa can. But Sweden cannot decide all this alone.”
The Turkish parliament still has to approve it. Only when this is done will Sweden become a member of NATO.
Apparently Stoltenberg managed to get Erdogan to make a concession a few hours before the actual start of the NATO summit. “Although we always have to be careful, it’s now being celebrated as a breakthrough, but we’ve had the feeling several times that it’s definitely there,” says Ramspeck. “The Turkish parliament still has to agree. Only when this is done can Sweden become a member of NATO. But it seems as if the states are on the very last few meters of the home stretch.”
Hungary also blocked
Sweden and Finland applied for NATO membership in May 2022 under the impression of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine. At the beginning of April, Finland became the 31st member of the alliance.
Sweden, on the other hand, still lacked the approval of Turkey and Hungary, which was primarily due to Turkey’s blockade attitude. Hungary recently reaffirmed that it would not stand in the way of Sweden’s admission should Turkey give the green light.
When announcing the meeting with Erdogan and Kristersson on Friday, Stoltenberg made it clear that he was counting on an end to the Turkish blockade. Any further delays would only be welcomed by the PKK and Russian President Vladimir Putin, he said.