Turkish parliament votes in favor of Sweden's NATO bid, clearing key hurdle

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and Prime Minister of Sweden Ulf Kristersson address a press conference in Stockholm (NATO)

WASHINGTON — Turkey’s parliament today approved a bill allowing Sweden to join NATO, all but removing one of the last major hurdles in an accession journey for Stockholm kickstarted by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Lawmakers in Ankara voted 287 to 55 in favor of Sweden’s move, according to media reports.

Today we are one step closer to becoming a full member of NATO. Positive that the Grand General Assembly of Türkiye has voted in favour of Sweden’s NATO accession.

— SwedishPM (@SwedishPM) January 23, 2024

Sweden applied for NATO membership in May 2022, the same day as Finland, and most NATO members moved quickly to ratify both applications. But from early in the process Turkey and Hungary played spoilers, both due to more complex relations with Russia and with Ankara’s specific demand that Stockholm take a harder line on figures that Turkey considers threats.

Both holdouts cleared the way for Finland’s formal accession in April 2023, but Sweden was left behind. Still, it was considered just a matter of time before Stockholm was allowed to follow suit.

In October, NATO leader Jens Stoltenberg said that Sweden was “fully ready to join NATO. The time has come. Following the submission of the ratification documents, I now count on a speedy ratification by the Turkish parliament.”

Three months later, Stockholm now appears to be only awaiting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s signature on today’s bill and then Hungary’s okay. Al Jazeera reported that today Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said he had invited Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson to visit and negotiate the final steps. Sweden would become the 32nd member of NATO.

Sweden’s main security guarantee of alliance membership sits under Article 5, which considers any attack on a NATO ally as the basis for retaliatory action by all. It will also benefit from the alliance’s nuclear capabilities and the associated deterrence effect those capabilities have on an enemy’s strategic decision making.

After announcing a defense spending increase of SEK 27 billion ($2.4 billion USD) from 2023 to 2024 — a rise of 28 percent — Sweden expects to hit NATO’s two percent GDP spending target this year. Stockholm has doubled military spending since 2022, with a total of just under SEK 120 billion ($10.8 billion USD) made available for 2024.

Breaking Defense’s Tim Martin contributed to this report.