Caracas.- This Tuesday, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Turkish Parliament approved Sweden’s accession to NATO, a step ahead of the plenary vote scheduled for January 16, which is necessary to ratify the accession.
The proposal for Sweden to join NATO was put forward by the AKP, the party that has ruled Turkey since 2002, and received votes in favor of its coalition partner, the ultra-nationalist MHP, and the social democratic CHP, the largest opposition party. .
The AKP and MHP together have an absolute majority in parliament, so approval of Sweden’s accession is taken for granted as soon as the country’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, gives the appropriate order to his deputies.
According to Turkish broadcaster NTV, the nationalist IYI party, which split from the MHP and is part of the opposition bloc, voted against it today. The DEM, the progressive and pro-Kudo party, was not present at the vote.
The commission consists of 27 MPs from different parties who have to check whether applications to parliament comply with the law before passing them on to the plenary session.
According to the aforementioned network, the proposal is expected to go to the general vote on January 16th.
Turkey and Hungary are the last two countries that have not yet agreed to accept the Nordic country.
In recent weeks, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has linked that approval to the agreement with the United States to sell F-16 fighter-bombers to Turkey, a transaction planned for years but blocked by the U.S. Congress.
“All of this is connected. “If the positive progress that we expect both from the United States on the F-16 issue and from Canada on its promises occurs, I believe that our Parliament will also accelerate its positive opinion,” Erdogan said a week ago., after speaking on the phone with his American counterpart Joe Biden.
With information from EFE