Swedish Foreign Minister: "Turkiye Expected to Ratify NATO Membership Proposal Within Weeks"

The Turkish parliament is expected to ratify Sweden's accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

Jens Stoltenberg, Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) (center), watches as Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President of Turkiye (left), and Ulf Kristersson, Prime Minister of Sweden, shake hands before the Turkiye-Sweden summit on July 10 (local time) in Vilnius, Lithuania. [Image source=Yonhap News]

On the 29th (local time), Tobias Billstr?m, Sweden's Foreign Minister, who attended the NATO foreign ministers' meeting held in Brussels, Belgium as a representative of an invited country, mentioned his meeting with Hakan Fidan, Turkey's Foreign Minister, the day before, saying, "He said that the ratification process is expected to take place within weeks."

He also added, "Turkey did not present any new demands (as conditions for ratification), so we consider that all necessary conditions have been met on our side."

Sweden, along with Finland, submitted its NATO membership application last May, three months after the outbreak of the Ukraine war, but has not yet joined as two member countries, Turkey and Hungary, have continued to delay the final procedures.

To join NATO as a new member country, all existing member countries must ratify the applicant country's accession protocol in their respective parliaments.