A solution for Sweden’s NATO membership is now being tried to be born in the Vilnius meeting to be celebrated during the chalk weeks. The permission to burn the Koran in Stockholm came at a sensitive moment, writes HS’s NATO correspondent Elina Kervinen.
Swedish, Representatives of Turkey, Finland and NATO are preparing to meet in Brussels next Thursday.
So is Sweden’s NATO membership now being resolved in such a way that we could celebrate at the Vilnius summit two weeks from now?
The high-level meeting at least shows that NATO has faith in a solution and that it is still possible by the time of the Vilnius meeting.
The meeting will be attended by foreign ministers, intelligence chiefs and national security advisors. A meeting of this level is hardly organized for nothing.
Still, nothing should be declared certain. There may be bumps in the road.
On Wednesday There was news in Sweden that the police have again given permission for the burning of the Koran in Stockholm. The case comes at a sensitive time. It is reportedly the first since the administrative court ruled in the spring that the police did not have sufficient grounds to deny similar permits earlier this year.
Koran burning in Stockholm in January infuriated Turkey and sparked a wider international movement.
I agree however, there is now very heavy pressure to obtain Sweden’s membership.
One key importance of NATO summits is political communication about the unity of the alliance: Therefore, from NATO’s point of view, it would be important that the headlines from Vilnius tell about solutions, not disputes.
With Russia messing up Ukraine, NATO would have to show that it is expanding and getting stronger. Turkey and Hungary, whose close relations with Russia have made their allies suspicious, would be allowed to show themselves as enablers of this.
Key the question is what Turkey ultimately gets and demands in return.
It has long been clear that the F-16 fighter jets it has acquired from the United States are a key part of the equation.
The puzzle can still be more complex. In any case, Turkey is at odds with other than Sweden.
According to several recent media reports and also HS background information, Turkey has delayed the approval of NATO’s new regional defense plans during the Vilnius meeting.
The regional defense plans are a very central part of the whole, with which NATO is supposed to strengthen its own deterrence and defense. It’s about of the broad wholewhere NATO’s defense is undergoing the biggest changes since the Cold War.
Al-Monitor magazine said on Tuesday that Turkey would demand, among other things, that the strategically important straits that connect the Black Sea via the Sea of Marmara to the Aegean Sea and the Mediterranean Sea be called “Turkey’s straits” and not “Straits” in the text.
According to the newspaper, the insignificant-sounding naming issue in itself could also have legal significance in that it would strengthen Turkey’s control over a significant water area.
What everything is related to the Swedish equation, one can only guess. It has been clear all along that Sweden’s actions alone cannot resolve membership. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan makes a decision when he considers the moment to be favorable for Turkey.
Office of the President of Turkey let it be understood last Sunday, that demonstrations supporting Kurdish organizations should be removed from the streets of Sweden if Sweden wants membership. Flags of the PKK, which is classified as a terrorist organization, were seen, for example, earlier in June at an anti-NATO demonstration in Stockholm.
The limits of freedom of speech in Sweden are wide, and it is certainly known in Turkey as well.
It still remains to be seen, for example, whether Sweden will have to make new gestures or concessions to Turkey before the flash lights of Vilnius.
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