Turkish foreign minister told Sweden their Nato bid will be ratified ‘within weeks’ – Europe live

03.26 EST

Turkey told Sweden it expects Nato bid ratification 'within weeks', Swedish minister saysTobias Billström, Sweden’s foreign minister, told reporters this morning that “it is high time to get the ratification done by both Türkiye and also by Hungary of course, and this was a clear message sent by the foreign ministers”.

For months, Turkey and Hungary have delayed ratification of Sweden’s Nato membership, fuelling frustration within the military alliance.

Speaking as Nato ministers meet in Brussels, Billström said:

We have a very dangerous moment in time for Europe and for the world – and for Nato as an organisation. With the security deteriorating and also with the war in Ukraine, Sweden’s membership in Nato is very important for the organisation.

Billström said he met with his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan yesterday.

He told me that he expected the ratification to take place within weeks. And of course, we don’t take anything for granted from the side of Sweden, but we look forward to this being completed.

And no new conditions were put forward in this conversation, there were no new demands from the Turkish government, so we look [at] our part as being fulfilled.

The Swedish minister also said that Hungary’s foreign minister Péter Szijjártó has repeated that Hungary will not be the last to ratify.

Billström added:

That means that it is more in the hands of Ankara than maybe of Budapest. We expect white smoke from Budapest the moment there is white smoke from Ankara, to put it very bluntly.

Turkish foreign minister Hakan Fidan, right, speaks with Swedish foreign minister Tobias Billström, left, before the Nato foreign ministers’ meeting at Nato headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, 28 November 2023.

Photograph: Reuters