Finnish president wants Finland and Sweden to join NATO by summer

HELSINKI (AP) – The Finnish president said in an interview released on Saturday that he hopes Finland and Sweden will be admitted to NATO by July and hinted that he wants the United States to pressure Turkey to approve their bids. for membership.

If the issue drags on, the whole process of accepting new members to the military alliance will be in question, President Sauli Niinistö said in an interview with the Finnish news agency STT.

“If it doesn’t happen by the meeting in Vilnius, why should it happen later?” Niinistö said.

Lithuania will host the NATO summit in the capital of the Baltic country on July 11-12.

NATO requires the unanimous approval of its existing members in order to admit new ones. Turkey and Hungary are the only countries in the 30-member military alliance that have not officially supported Sweden and Finland joining.

While Hungary promised to do so in February, Turkey has not expressed readiness to ratify the accession of the two countries anytime soon. Niinistö stressed that Turkey’s final decision depends on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“I think that under no circumstances will he succumb to any public pressure,” Niinistö said. “But if something comes to light during the bilateral talks between Turkey and the United States, it could have an impact.”

Turkey has refrained from approving Sweden and Finland’s accession to NATO because, among other things, it was furious at a recent series of demonstrations in Stockholm by activists who burned a Koran outside the Turkish embassy and hung an effigy of Erdogan.

In January, Ankara indefinitely postponed a key meeting in Brussels, which discussed the accession of the two Scandinavian countries to NATO.

Niinistö said that last spring Finland and Sweden heard many encouraging statements from NATO – the Nordic duo announced their intention to join NATO in May – about a smooth and painless membership process.

He said that did not happen, adding that the delay was not only a headache for the two candidate countries.

“I see that this has already become a problem for NATO. Obviously, the NATO countries were also surprised,” Niinistö said.

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