NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg urged Ankara on Thursday on ratifying Sweden and Finland’s bids to join the Western alliance during his visit to offer support after devastating earthquakes struck Türkiye last week.
Stoltenberg, which will also visit Turkish areas affected by the quake, announced that NATO would be sending tens of thousands of tents to Türkiye as authorities race to offer shelter to people left homeless by last week’s catastrophic earthquake that destroyed or heavily damaged more than 50,000 buildings across 11 provinces in the country.
Noting that the recent earthquake was the deadliest natural disaster on NATO territory since the alliance was founded, Stoltenberg added that NATO stands with Turkey in its time of need and that it would use its strategic airlift capabilities to transport aid more swiftly.
At the same time, in an attempt to move forward the two countries’ ratification process to join the military alliance, Stoltenberg repeated his claim that Sweden and Finland have done enough to satisfy Ankara’s demands to crack down on extremism.
Only Hungary and Türkiye of the 30 NATO members have so far failed to approve the two Nordic nations’ applications to join the alliance, after abandoning decades of nonalignment alarmed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago.
Türkiye, which accuses Sweden of being too soft on groups it considers terror organizations or existential threats, including Kurdish groups, has increased its opposition to Swedish membership in recent weeks partially due to anti-Muslim protests in the country that included public burning of the Quran, the Muslim holy book.
When it comes to Finland, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said earlier this month that Ankara has fewer problems with its application, leading Stoltenberg to soften his stance on Finland possibly joining NATO before Sweden though he previously insisted that the Nordic duo should join the alliance the same time.
