Hungary has said it will approve Sweden’s NATO bid now that Turkey has dropped its objection, but both the Hungarian and Turkish parliaments will not take up the issue until the fall.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Wednesday that his country’s parliament will approve Sweden’s NATO bid when it comes back in session in October.
Hungarian lawmakers have said there’s no need to call an extraordinary session to ratify Sweden’s NATO bid since Turkey won’t be doing so until October. Hungary’s parliament is expected to start working on the issue in mid-September.
Turkey had been blocking Sweden’s NATO bid over allegations that the country supports the PKK, a Kurdish militant group Turkey considers a terrorist organization. To placate Turkey, Sweden passed new anti-terror laws, lifted an arms embargo on Turkey, and is responding to Turkish extradition requests.
Erdogan agreed to withdraw his objection the day before NATO’s summit in Vilnius, which was held on Tuesday and Wednesday. Sweden has ditched its long-standing policy of neutrality and will become the 32nd member of the NATO alliance, committing the US to the defense of yet another country.
NATO should have gone the way of the Berlin Wall, Warsaw Pact & USSR. It’s still around & its membership keeps growing. The US broke its promise not to expand NATO east of Germany’s borders.
And why precisely do you think those new countries feel the need to join NATO?
They have false senses of security. The US likes to dominate the world and they fall for it. Russia never posed threats to anyone after Cold War I.
The US & much of its allies make up stuff to use Russia and China as scapegoats.
“hey! kiss my ass world!”
…. uncle sam
Why? They get goodies. And some of them are consumed by irrational hatred of Russians and all things Russian. That’s why.
“Irrational,” huh!”?
May be free weapons lots of USD come with US bases ect ect and do you really think NATO would go to war with Russia over a little country ? , they backed off when Russia went into Georgia when NATO hinted to the Georgian Government it would step in to stop Russia , the NATO NUMPTIES never dreamed for a second the Georgian war criminals would take them up on their offer lol. and that is what they have done with Zelensky they have given all sorts of assurances but all they do is supply weapons but what he needs are infantry which NATO ain`t going to supply .
The Sultan of Swing is back to doing what is his default mode: pivoting all over the place.. This time his aim is to once again attempt to gain admittance to the EU gravy train..
Difficult to believe that Orban of Hungary has changed his mind regarding Sweden’s approval.. What has changed?
So basically Erdogan has been bribed to drop his objections ? , typical American move .
Well, also a typical Erdogan move. His position on International Issue X always seems to be driven by the question of who will offer him — or, if you want to assumee nationalist high-mindedness, Turkey — the most and best goodies to adopt that position.
And Turkey is in a great position to extract such bribes. It borders several nations that are constantly subject to foreign interventions, and can take whatever side of those interventions it deems most profitable to itself. And it controls access to and exit from the Black Sea, which gives it additional leverage.
A lot of people described Donald Trump as a “transactional” president, but he’s a piker compared to Erdogan.