Turkey’s eagerness to obtain F-16 fighter jets from the US should motivate it to complete the ratification of Sweden’s accession to NATO, said the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
The US has indicated that approval of the Nordic country’s entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a prerequisite for agreeing to sell the planes to Ankara, whose delay remains the last major obstacle to Sweden’s membership.
“They are very eager to get our F-16s, and they need to be a NATO ally to us as well if we are going to sell them those kinds of weapons systems,” Representative Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican, said at a news conference in Stockholm. “They understand that there is a lot at stake for them if they do not agree to the accession.”
Sweden applied to enter NATO jointly with Finland in May 2022, months after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Finland became a member of NATO in April, but Turkey spent more than a year objecting to Sweden’s application until President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in July agreed to support the bid. Turkey’s parliament, which needs to pass it into law, won’t resume work until October.
The Turkish president recently tied delays in the ratification process to a number of Koran burnings that have sparked anger in the Muslim world and led to threats against Sweden from extremists, saying that the country should “first of all take care of the streets of Stockholm.” Sweden, which condemns the desecration of holy texts, is looking into changing laws on public order in response.
In a press conference with Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom and Representative Gregory Meeks of New York, the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs panel, McCaul said he sees no indications that Erdogan would back out of his July pledge to support the approval.
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