Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday expressed support this week for Sweden to join NATO, dampening expectations that he would quickly push approval through Turkey’s parliament.
In his first public comments on the issue after announcing his support for the NATO proposal on Monday, Mr Erdogan said the final decision rested with parliament and that Sweden needed to take more steps to win parliament’s support, without giving specifics. He said that though Parliament is in session till July 27, it will not take up the matter till October.
Mr. Erdogan’s remarks, hinting that Sweden’s accession is not a done deal, are bound to disappoint many of his NATO allies, who have hoped that Mr Erdogan has used the issue to win concessions for Turkey over the past year. an end Mr Erdogan said Sweden needed to continue working to address Turkey’s security concerns, suggesting it was not yet ready to give up its leverage.
“Parliament is not in session for the next two months,” Mr Erdogan told reporters in Vilnius, Lithuania at the end of the annual NATO summit. “But our goal is to finalize this matter as soon as possible.”
Sweden and Finland applied to join NATO after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year. Turkey initially opposed allowing any country to join, accusing Turkey of harboring dissidents it considers terrorists.
Mr. But Turkey’s grievances against Sweden are greater. Turkish officials have accused Sweden of giving free rein to supporters of a Kurdish terrorist organization and members of a religious group that Turkey accuses of plotting a failed coup against Mr Erdogan in 2016.
To appease Turkey, Sweden has amended its constitution, strengthened its anti-terrorism laws, dropped an embargo on arms exports to Turkey, and agreed to extradite a small number of people requested by Turkey.
But Swedish courts have blocked other extraditions and Swedish authorities have said they cannot override their country’s freedom of expression laws to prevent public protests involving the burning of the Koran. The protests have angered Turkey.
Then, on Monday, NATO leaders announced that Turkey had dropped its objection to Sweden joining the alliance as part of a new deal aimed at allowing NATO leaders to express a stronger sense of unity against Russian President Vladimir V. Putin.
