NATO chief urges Turkey to stop stalling Sweden, Finland accession
Both Turkey's president and foreign minister tell the NATO secretary-general that steps from Sweden and Finland will determine the pace of Ankara’s ratification of the Nordic accession.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg urged Turkey to ratify the accession of Sweden and Finland to NATO as soon as possible, saying those two countries had lived up to their obligations to address Turkey’s security concerns.
But Mevlut Cavusoglu, Turkey’s foreign minister, said that while progress was made, it was still impossible to say that Turkey’s conditions had been fully met. Cavusoglu, however, added that Turkey had a more positive outlook toward the new Swedish government and was looking forward to the visit of Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson “in a few days.”
Stoltenberg is on a two-day visit to Turkey, the only country that has made no move to ratify the alliance’s Nordic expansion after Hungary said it would seek to seal the accession accord by mid-December. Stoltenberg will meet President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Defense Minister Hulusi Akar on Friday for further talks.
“The pace and the finalization of the ratification” for the Nordic enlargement would depend on the steps taken by Sweden and Finland, a brief statement from the presidency said after the Erdogan-Stoltenberg meeting late Friday.
