Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday introduced a new condition for approving Sweden’s membership in NATO, calling on European countries to “open the way” for Turkey to join the European Union.
The surprise announcement by Erdogan before departing to a NATO summit in Lithuania’s capital added new uncertainty to Sweden’s bid to become the alliance’s 32nd member, which Turkey initially blocked saying Sweden was too soft on Kurdish militants and other groups that Ankara considers security threats.
It was the first time that Erdogan linked his country’s ambition to join the EU with Sweden’s efforts to become a NATO member.
“Turkey has been waiting at the door of the European Union for over 50 years now, and almost all of the NATO member countries are now members of the European Union,” Erdogan told reporters in Istanbul. “I am making this call to these countries that have kept Turkey waiting at the gates of the European Union for more than 50 years.”
“Come and open the way for Turkey’s membership in the European Union. When you pave the way for Turkey, we’ll pave the way for Sweden as we did for Finland,” he added.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Monday said Sweden’s push to join NATO should not be connected to Turkey’s stalled EU membership bid.
“Sweden meets all the requirements for NATO membership,” Scholz told reporters in Berlin. “The other question is one that is not connected with it and that is why I do not think it should be seen as a connected issue.”
Sweden and Finland applied for NATO membership last year, abandoning their policies of military non-alignment due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. New members require approval from all NATO countries, and Finland was given the green light in April.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that while he supports Ankara’s EU membership, as far as he was concerned, Sweden had already met the conditions required to join NATO.
“It is still possible to have a positive decision on Sweden in Vilnius,” Stoltenberg told a news conference.
Turkey first applied to become a member of the European Economic Community, a predecessor to the EU, in 1987.
It became an EU candidate country in 1999 and formally launched membership negotiations with the bloc in 2005.
The talks stalled in 2016 over European concerns about human rights violations in Turkey.
The White House, which has also supported Turkey’s EU aspirations, said those discussions are a matter between Turkey and the bloc’s 27 members.
“Our focus is on Sweden, which is ready to join the NATO alliance,” a White House National Security Council spokesperson said.
On Sunday, Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said Biden and Erdogan had spoken about Sweden’s NATO membership and had agreed to meet in Vilnius for further talks.
He added that the White House is confident Sweden will join the alliance.
“If it happens after Vilnius – we’re confident it will happen,” he said.
“We don’t regard this as something that is fundamentally in doubt. This is a matter of timing. The sooner the better.”
