Turkey To Resume Sweden And Finland NATO Membership Application Talks On March 9

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu. (Wikimedia Commons/Ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken)

JAKARTA - Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Monday talks with Sweden and Finland regarding the two countries' North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) membership application would resume on March 9, although he said Sweden had still not fulfilled its obligations under a memorandum signed last year.

Turkey in January canceled talks with Sweden and Finland over their application, after a far-right Danish politician burned a copy of the Koran outside the Turkish Embassy in Stockholm.

"My colleagues will attend the meeting to be held on March 9," Foreign Minister Cavusoglu told a press conference in Ankara, adding the meeting would be held in Brussels, Belgium, reported Reuters February 27.

Sweden and Finland applied for NATO membership last year, after Russia invaded Ukraine. However, Sweden in particular faced unexpected objections from Turkey.

Ankara accuses Stockholm of harboring what it considers to be members of a terrorist group.

Later, Sweden, Finland, and Turkey signed a memorandum on steps toward Turkey's ratification at a NATO summit in Madrid in 2022.

"Unfortunately, we have not seen satisfactory steps from Sweden in implementing the Madrid memorandum," said Foreign Minister Cavusoglu.

"It would be impossible for us to say 'yes' to Sweden's NATO application before we saw these steps," he said.

Meanwhile, the Swedish government plans to formally decide on March 9 on the long-planned proposal, related to the banned status of those who are part of or support terrorist organizations.

Stockholm is aiming for the law to enter into force on June 1, although no date has yet been set for a parliamentary vote on the bill.

Separately, the United States and other NATO countries hope the two Nordic nations will become members of the alliance at a NATO summit to be held on July 11 in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius.

It is understood that although Ankara has indicated that it could approve Finland's application, it has given no guarantees that it will give the green light to Sweden's application by then.