ANKARA — As Western efforts to pave the way for Sweden’s accession to NATO are amping up, Turkey's new Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Wednesday called on Stockholm to take concrete steps toward that goal.
Fidan held a phone call with his Swedish counterpart Tobias Billstrom as part of a whirlwind phone traffic with more than a dozen of his foreign counterparts since taking office on Monday.
Sweden’s pending NATO membership has come to the forefront following the May 14 general elections that saw Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan extending his rule into a new term.
US President Joe Biden raised the matter with Erdogan during a phone call last week over Erdogan’s election victory. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg also traveled to Ankara in a fresh push to convince Erdogan’s government to greenlight Sweden’s accession before the bloc’s leaders summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, on July 11-12.
