Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan unexpectedly announced on Monday that The European Union must open the way for Ankara to join the bloc beforehow the Turkish parliament will approve Sweden’s application to join the NATO military alliance.
Turkey’s accession negotiations EU were frozen for years after accession negotiations began in 2005, during Erdogan’s first term as prime minister.
Relations between Ankara and members of the bloc deteriorated a few years ago, especially after the failed coup attempt in Turkey in 2016, but then improved. The bloc depends on the help of Ankara, a NATO ally, especially in matters of migration.
On Monday, Erdogan unexpectedly changed his positionlinking Ankara’s approval of Sweden’s application for NATO membership with Turkey’s final entry into the EU.
“I am speaking from here to these countries that have made Turkey wait at the door of the European Union for more than 50 years, – Erdogan said, speaking before leaving for the NATO summit in Vilnius. – First, come and open the way for Turkey to the European Union, and then we will open the way for Sweden, as we did with Finland.” He added that he would repeat his call during the summit.
The representative of the European Commission was somewhat shocked, but did not lose his head, saying that the expansion of NATO and the EU is “separate processes”. “The process of accession of each candidate country to NATO is based on the merits of each country”, – said the representative of the European Commission, adding that these two processes cannot be connected.
Asked about Erdogan’s comments, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that while he supports Ankara’s EU membership, he believes Sweden has already met the conditions necessary to join NATO. “A positive decision on Sweden is still possible in Vilnius,” Stoltenberg said at a press conference.
VILNIUS SUMMIT
Sweden and Finland applied to join NATO last year, abandoning the policy of military non-alignment that continued through decades of the Cold War in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. While Finland was given the green light to join NATO in April, Turkey and Hungary have yet to approve Sweden’s bid. Stockholm is making efforts to join the bloc at the Vilnius summit.
Erdogan said that Sweden’s accession to NATO depends on the implementation of the agreement reached last summer at the alliance’s summit in Madrid, and added that no one should expect compromises from Ankara. She believes that Sweden is not taking sufficient action against those whom Turkey considers terrorists, mainly members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is considered a terrorist organization in Turkey, the EU and the US.
Sinan Ulgen, a former diplomat and director of the Istanbul-based Center for Economic and Foreign Policy Studies, believes Erdogan’s move will not strengthen Turkey’s position at the Vilnius summit. “The positive side of this unexpected move is that it showed that Turkey still has EU accession prospects. But it’s hard to say that it will contribute to any progress on Turkey’s EU membership,” he said.
Erdogan also said that ending the war between Ukraine and Russia would make it easier for Kyiv to join NATO… In the meantime, we need to fight Russia… to the last Ukrainian.
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