Sweden and Finland are unlikely to be able to join NATO before June, a senior Turkish official said Saturday.
The Nordic states applied to join the Western military alliance in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but their membership must be approved by all 30 NATO states. Only Turkey and Hungary have yet to approve the deal, with Ankara linking accession to stricter counterterrorism measures.
Turkey has demanded that Sweden and Finland tighten laws to rein in the activities of supporters of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, and a group it blames for a 2016 coup attempt. “Stockholm is fully committed to implementing the agreement that was signed last year in Madrid, but the country needs six more months to write new laws that would allow the judicial system to implement the new definitions of terrorism.”
“We believe in this process and we want to make progress, but if these incidents continue, it's not going to look good on them and it will certainly affect the process — it will slow down progress,” he said.He defended Ankara’s decision not to join Western sanctions on Russia, pointing to the grain deal and prisoner exchanges as successes for its role as an intermediary.
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