Sweden and Finland, which have never previously belonged to the alliance, have now applied for membership in Nato. It requires that all of NATO’s 30 member states ratify such an expansion in their parliaments. 29 of the countries have announced their support, but Turkish President Erdogan has been waiting and has demanded that Sweden change its asylum policy and that the country extradite Kurds who have challenged Turkey’s security and violated the country’s terrorism legislation. Seen in the light of the fact that Europe is facing the continent’s biggest war since World War II, this is an unacceptable demand for power politics. It is unreasonable for Erdogan to take advantage of the Swedes’ pressured situation to consolidate his own power. Turkey is an important member of NATO, and that is precisely why Erdogan knows that he has an opportunity to push forward concessions from a future NATO member state. Despite the fact that one must have an understanding of Turkey’s security policy challenges, it is wrong to link this to Swedish membership in NATO. With this as a backdrop, NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg has a demanding diplomatic landscape in which he must maneuver. His most important task will be to make Turkey understand that Sweden and Finland in NATO will consolidate and strengthen democratic Europe. Therefore, the expansion is also in Turkey’s national interests. This is a major challenge since Turkey claims that its interests often do not coincide with NATO’s interests. Recently, Turkish President Erdogan met Russian President Putin in Moscow. There they agreed to strengthen cooperation between the countries in the fields of economy and energy. Turkey is thus the NATO country that actively opposes the sanctions against Russia, which the rest of the world’s decent countries stand behind. This comes on top of the fact that Turkey has signed extensive agreements with Russia on the purchase of advanced weapons systems. Thus, Turkey has already stretched the rope far, up against their loyalty to the alliance partners. Regardless of what Turkey ends up with in terms of position on the issue of Swedish and Finnish NATO membership, the country has demonstrated that it opposes the other member states’ goals and intentions, when the country finds it politically opportune. Should Turkey’s National Assembly choose to veto Sweden’s membership in NATO, this will create a fundamental rift in the alliance and one will have to question Turkey’s focus, loyalty, contribution and the alliance’s common value base. Only Putin can benefit from that.
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NATO’s demanding balancing act – Statement
