ZURICH Feb 2 Sweden and Finland will continue to fulfill their obligations , taken before Ankara on joining NATO, which were included in the text of the corresponding tripartite memorandum, Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said.
“I appreciate the very clear messages from Finland… that we are on this path together (of joining NATO – ed.). We worked together on the implementation of the trilateral memorandum with Turkey. We have achieved concrete results on all parts of the memorandum and will continue to implement it right now” , — said Kristersson at a briefing in Stockholm after a bilateral meeting with Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin.
He stressed that Sweden will continue to implement the mentioned memorandum together with Finland.
The politician also reminded about the bill, which was presented on Thursday, providing for toughening of the Swedish legislation on terrorist activities.
«The bill will be sent to Parliament in March and the new anti-terror laws will come into effect on June 1. This is the cornerstone of Sweden's long-term commitment to combating terrorism, whether that activity is aimed at hurting Sweden or hurting other countries.» — said the Swedish prime minister.
Finland and Sweden, against the backdrop of events in Ukraine last May, submitted applications to the NATO Secretary General to join the alliance. At first, Turkey blocked the process of considering these applications, but already on June 29, Turkey, Sweden and Finland signed a security memorandum that takes into account all Ankara's concerns. To date, Sweden and Finland's applications to NATO have not been ratified by only two countries out of 30 — these are Hungary and Turkey.
Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billström recently said that against the backdrop of actions with the burning of the Koran, the process of the kingdom's accession to NATO was suspended, but expressed hope that agreements with Ankara could be reached at the summit of the foreign ministries of the alliance countries in Vilnius in July. According to a source in Ankara, the tripartite mechanism for the process of membership of Sweden and Finland in NATO has been suspended for an indefinite period at the request of the Turkish side.
Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto allowed the continuation of the procedure for ratifying the country's application to the North Atlantic Alliance separately from Sweden, but then took his words back. In turn, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that Turkey did not receive proposals from Finland on a separate application from Sweden for joining NATO.