Sweden’s ruling Social Democrats are in favor of joining NATO

Sweden’s Defense Minister Peter Hultqvist, Foreign Minister Ann Linde and Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson (from left)

The government is heading towards NATO.

(Photo: via REUTERS)

Stockholm After Finland, Sweden also spoke out in favor of joining NATO on Sunday. Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson’s ruling Social Democrats voted “Yes to NATO” by a large majority. The party announced this early in the evening.

Should one be included in the defense alliance, one wants to work towards the fact that no nuclear weapons are stationed on Swedish territory. The statement also says they are opposed to permanent NATO bases in Sweden. “In the current situation, of course, we have to join NATO,” said Defense Minister Peter Hultqvist.

After Russian troops invaded Ukraine, the pro-Nato decision came as no surprise. After more than 200 years of non-alignment, Sweden feels threatened by Russian aggression. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg showed understanding for the desire of the two northern European countries to join NATO in view of the war in Ukraine. And he declared at the end of the NATO foreign ministers’ meeting in Berlin: “Ukraine can win this war.”

The fact that neighboring Finland, with which Sweden maintains close military cooperation, formally decided to join NATO on Sunday made the Swedish decision even more likely. After parliamentary debates in both countries on Monday, applications for membership will be submitted in the coming days.

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In contrast to Finland, the social-democratic Swedish minority government struggled with the NATO membership application. On Sunday, the decision was only made after almost six hours of debate. While there is a large parliamentary majority for membership, there is rumbling within the Social Democratic Party. On Saturday, party members demonstrated in front of party headquarters against joining NATO. Because of the inner-party strife, even leading Social Democrats found it extremely difficult to position themselves clearly on the issue.

Turkey announces reservations

Both countries’ application for membership must be accepted by all 30 NATO members. To the surprise of the two accession candidates, but also of the other NATO members, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced reservations about the admission of Finland and Sweden. “We follow the developments in Finland and Sweden. And we don’t see that as a positive thing,” he explained, adding, “They are a guest house for terrorists.”

What was meant were supporters of the Kurdish Workers’ Party PKK, which is banned in Turkey, the EU and the USA. In Erdogan’s opinion, Finland and above all Sweden do not act consistently enough against members of the PKK.

At the meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Berlin on Saturday, Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto and his Swedish counterpart Ann Linde nonetheless expressed confidence that a solution would be found with Turkey.

Turkish President Erdogan

Does he prevent the newcomers from joining?

(Photo: IMAGO/ITAR-TASS)

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu stressed that there were “good discussions” with Sweden and Finland. “We told them what we expected,” he explained. One of Erdogan’s advisors had stressed the day before that his country had “not closed any doors”. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was optimistic that a compromise would be found. Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) held out the prospect of a very speedy admissions process for both northern European countries.

However, both countries are concerned about the transition phase between a possible NATO membership application and actual admission to the North Atlantic defense alliance. Paragraph 5 would not yet be effective at this time. He defines the alliance case: an armed attack against one or more members would be considered an attack on all contracting parties. In the past few weeks, however, Finland and Sweden have already received security guarantees from the USA and other NATO countries.

In the run-up to the decisions in Helsinki and Stockholm, Moscow had threatened consequences if it joined NATO. Finland has already felt it: Russia has not been supplying electricity to the neighboring country since midnight on Saturday. Since Finland only gets around ten percent of its electricity from Russia, the delivery stop will not have any major impact on the electricity supply, according to the Finnish grid operator Fingrid.

With the NATO accession of Finland and Sweden, all Baltic Sea countries would be members of the defense alliance. The land, sea and air forces of both countries are considered very modern and have long participated in joint NATO operations in the Balkans and Afghanistan.

More: The NATO military alliance simply explained.

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