Turkey Gives Way To Sweden, Finland Joining NATO
- 30-Jun-2022
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Madrid: Turkey has now changed its position and has agreed to support the Nordic countries NATO membership applications during the ongoing NATO Summit in Madrid. Now Sweden and Finland may join NATO. However, conflicts within the military bloc still remain.
After an extended meeting among leaders from the three countries together with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Tuesday afternoon, a trilateral memorandum addressing Turkey’s security concerns was agreed and signed, paving the way for the two Nordic states’ NATO membership applications.
Sweden and Finland had earlier declined to seek Nato membership over concerns around their security relationship with Russia. This situation was changed after Russia began unprovoked attacks on Ukraine in February, triggering both the countries into seeking membership for NATO.
The Swedish and Finnish leaders will now be able to attend the Nato summit on Wednesday and Thursday as invitees which suggests that their countries are set to join NATO as full members. Turkey had earlier refused to support their applications as it wanted to have satisfactory assurances that the Nordic countries were willing to address the problem of terrorism, specifically in the case of those groups it considers as terrorist organisations.
