President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan expressed that Türkiye is ready to develop bilateral relations with the Swedish government in all fields in a phone call on Wednesday with Sweden's new prime minister, Ulf Kristersson.
According to a statement by the Presidency's Directorate of Communications, Erdoğan and Kristersson discussed bilateral relations in the phone call.
The leaders discussed the letter sent to Erdoğan by the Swedish prime minister on Oct. 19 in which he outlines the "concrete action" Stockholm has taken to meet Ankara's conditions regarding its NATO membership. Erdoğan also congratulated Kristersson on becoming prime minister and said he would be pleased to host him in the capital Ankara.
In the call, Erdoğan emphasized that it is in the countries' common interest to prevent terrorist organizations from taking Sweden's NATO membership bid and bilateral relations with Türkiye hostage.
For his part, Kristersson released a statement on his Twitter account after his phone call with Erdoğan announcing that his government would comply with the trilateral memorandum on its NATO accession.
“We had a constructive telephone conversation with President Erdoğan in terms of bilateral relations. I look forward to visiting Ankara as soon as possible. My government will fulfill the tripartite memorandum between Türkiye, Sweden, and Finland for NATO membership,” Kristersson said.
According to one of Sweden's daily newspapers, the new prime minister sent a letter to Erdoğan via the Swedish Embassy in Ankara on Oct. 21. In the letter, it was reported that Kristersson said, "I hope we can have a detailed discussion about this (NATO membership) in a short time. I am ready to come to Ankara as soon as possible.”
Kristersson emphasized that he wanted to deepen cooperation with Türkiye at various levels, especially in the fight against terrorism. "We take Türkiye's security issues very seriously and we want to cooperate in the fight against terrorism, including the threats from the terrorist organization PKK and all other terrorist organizations and their branches," he said.
Meanwhile, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg announced Wednesday that he would visit Türkiye for talks on Sweden and Finland's NATO membership bids.
Stoltenberg said that he would discuss the countries' accession processes with the Turkish president soon.
For Sweden and Finland to become NATO members, their applications must be ratified by all 30 NATO members. So far, 28 have already done so – only Türkiye and Hungary have votes still pending. Türkiye's Parliament must ratify the country's approval for Finland and Sweden's membership for them to join NATO.
Sweden and Finland formally applied to join NATO in June, a decision spurred by Russia's war on Ukraine. However, Türkiye voiced objections to the membership bids, criticizing the countries for tolerating and even supporting terrorist groups.
A trilateral memorandum at the NATO Madrid summit signed among the countries in June stipulates that Finland and Sweden will not provide support to the PKK's Syrian offshoots, the YPG and the PYD, or the Gülenist Terrorist Group (FETÖ) – the group behind the 2016 defeated coup in Türkiye.
Sweden and Finland agreed earlier this summer to assure Türkiye of their support against security risks. Among Türkiye’s demands were the repatriation of some suspects and Sweden lifting its arms embargo. Sweden said that it is ready to supply weapons to Türkiye as part of its bid to join NATO.
