alliance
This is Erdogan’s condition for Sweden to join NATO
The Turkish parliament led by President Erdogan could vote on Sweden’s accession to NATO at the beginning of October. photo
© Pavel Golovkin/AP/dpa
In view of the war against Ukraine, Sweden has applied for NATO membership. Until now, Turkish President Erdogan has prevented accession – now he is tying admission to a deal.
In order for Sweden to be accepted into the alliance, it still needs approval from Turkey and Hungary. In view of Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, the country applied for NATO membership together with Finland in May 2022. Finland was welcomed as the 31st member at the beginning of April.
Turkey wants to buy new F-16 fighter jets and modern equipment from the USA. The US government is supporting the upgrade of existing F-16 fighter jets and the provision of new jets to Turkey. However, headwind comes from senators in the USA. After reopening in early October, the Turkish parliament could vote on Sweden’s accession to NATO.
Hungary’s approval fails for the time being due to its Prime Minister Viktor Orban. “There is nothing that would force Hungary to do this,” he said in the Budapest parliament. As justification, he cited a video from 2019 that was allegedly shown in Swedish schools and would sow doubts about the state of democracy in Hungary. However, observers in Budapest assume that Hungary’s parliament will ratify Sweden’s accession to NATO as soon as Turkey does.