International Desk: Turkey will allow Sweden to get NATO membership in exchange for F-16 fighter jets. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan gave such a condition to the US Congress on Friday. News from AFP.
Erdogan reiterated on Friday that parliament would only act on Sweden if the US Congress allowed Turkey to buy dozens of F-16 fighter jets and spare parts.
Regarding the United States, Erdoğan told reporters, “You said you would take action on the F-16 issue after the bill is passed in Congress.” You know, we also have a parliament. If we are two allied countries in NATO, then what you can do on your side together, with solidarity, we can also do on our parliament’s side.’
Sweden and Finland ended decades of military neutrality and sought nuclear protection from the US-led coalition in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year. The two countries’ applications were approved by the rest of the NATO members except Turkey and Hungary.
However, with the support of Turkey and Hungary, Finland was accepted into NATO as the 31st member this year.
Erdogan withdrew his objections to Sweden’s membership in July after Stockholm took action against Kurdish groups active around Turkey. Because Turkey considers Kurdish groups terrorists,.
But Turkey’s parliament’s foreign affairs committee delayed sending the request to the full chamber for a vote last month. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg strongly condemned the incident.
Turkey’s legacy air force has been hurt by Ankara’s withdrawal from the US-led F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program in 2019. Erdogan wanted to buy modern Russian missile defense systems. Due to this, Washington has done this to take revenge against Turkey.
But US President Joe Biden’s administration has repeatedly promised to push ahead with the $20 billion F-16 fighter jet sale. But congressional leaders have repeatedly balked at allowing the deal. They have raised concerns about Turkey’s human rights record and past standoffs with NATO member Greece.
The issue is compounded by Turkey’s anger at Washington for supporting Israel in the Gaza war. Erdogan said on Friday that he has no intention of meeting Joe Biden anytime soon.
He said, “Meeting with President Biden is not on our agenda. You all know their position on Gaza. If he calls us, we will meet him and talk about what we have to talk about.’
Sweden’s foreign minister said last week that his Turkish counterpart had promised him that Ankara would approve Stockholm’s membership in NATO within weeks. But Turkey’s parliament’s foreign affairs committee has yet to schedule a hearing on the proposal.
