US supports Sweden, Finland immediate accession into NATO, Blinken says during Turkey visit

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington strongly supports the immediate accession of Sweden and Finland into NATO during a visit to Turkey. Blinken said the two Nordic countries have already taken the steps that were laid out in the trilateral memorandum they have with Turkey.

Blinken said on Monday that the United States strongly supports the quick accession of Finland and Sweden into the NATO alliance, saying that Helsinki and Stockholm have already taken the necessary steps in the memorandum of agreement they have with Turkey. Finland and Sweden have jointly applied for NATO membership as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and only Turkey and Hungary have yet to ratify the two countries’ bids to join the alliance.

Turkey is seen as the main holdout in Finland and Sweden’s NATO bids. Ankara says Sweden is harboring members of what Turkey considers terrorist groups. Following protests in Stockholm in January, Turkey has hinted that it may only consider Finland’s application than Sweden’s.

“Finland and Sweden have already taken concrete steps to fulfill the commitments that they met under the trilateral memorandum of agreement that they signed,” said Blinken, reiterating that the issue of NATO’s Nordic expansion is not a bilateral one with Turkey and that the US strongly supports Finland and Sweden’s immediate accession into the alliance.

However, Blinken’s Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavosoglu said all parties in the NATO alliance must convince Sweden to take more action in order to address Turkey’s concerns. Cavosoglu said Sweden still needed to do more when pressed if Turkey would approve Stockholm’s accession by the annual NATO summit in July.

Meanwhile, US President Joe Biden is set to reassure NATO allies of security in the alliance’s eastern flank this week. Biden arrived in Poland on Monday after making a surprise visit to Ukraine. The US leader is set to meet with Polish President Andrzej Duda and before leaving Warsaw, Biden will meet with the leaders of the Bucharest Nine, the eastern flank NATO allies, to reassure support for their security.

“President Biden will make clear that the United States will continue to stand with Ukraine, as you’ve heard him say many times, for as long as it takes,” said White House national security spokesperson John Kirby.