Turkish parliament ratifies Finland's NATO membership

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Turkish parliament on Thursday ratified Finland's application for NATO membership, lifting the final hurdle in the Nordic country's long-delayed path to membership in NATO. the Western military alliance.

< p>The 276 lawmakers present voted in favor of Finland's membership, days after the Hungarian parliament also approved Helsinki's membership.

Alarmed by Russia's invasion of Ukraine a year ago, Finland and Sweden abandoned their decades-long policy of non-alignment and asked to join the alliance.

Full unanimity is required to admit new members to the 30-member alliance, and Turkey and Hungary were the last two NATO members to ratify Finland's membership .

Sweden's bid to join the alliance, meanwhile, has been left in abeyance, with Turkey and Hungary refusing to give it the go-ahead despite its support for expanding the alliance. 'NATO.

The Turkish government accuses Sweden of being too lenient towards groups it considers terrorist organizations and security threats, including Kurdish militant groups and people associated with an attempted coup in 2016.

More recently, Turkey has been angered by a series of protests in Sweden, including that of an anti-Islam activist who burned the Koran outside the embassy of Turkey.

The Hungarian government maintains that some Swedish politicians have made derisory statements about the state of Hungarian democracy and played an active role in ensuring that billions of funds from the European Union are frozen due to alleged breaches of the rule of law and democracy.

Turkish officials said that, unlike Sweden, Finland has fulfilled its obligations under a memorandum signed last year under which the two countries pledged to address the concerns of security of Turkey.

"As a member of NATO, we naturally had expectations and demands regarding the security problems of our country", Akif Cagatay Kilic told parliament before the vote , a lawmaker from Erdogan's ruling party. "I would like to highlight the concrete measures and their implementation by Finland, which has supported and shaped the decision we are taking here.

Kilic added: "I know there are many of people watching from Finland. ... We can say to them: "Welcome to NATO".

Some opposition parties have criticized the position of the Turkish government towards the two Nordic countries.

"Unfortunately, (Erdogan's ruling party) has transformed the right of veto in Finland and Sweden...