Sweden’s NATO application is on the agenda for the Turkish parliament’s foreign affairs committee on Boxing Day. This is stated in a message on the parliament’s website.
The last time the committee discussed Sweden’s application, in mid-November, there was a lively debate and the decision was deferred to the future.
– We are of course not in a hurry, we have our own priorities, said committee chairman Fuat Oktay to the Bloomberg news agency in mid-December.
Word choice important
When the 26 members (27 including Erdogan) now take up the issue again, at 1 pm on Monday Swedish time, a total of ten points will be discussed. The one concerning Sweden is last on the list.
If the committee gets to the last item on the agenda, according to the Turkish journalist Guldener Sonumut, it is especially important to look at the choice of words that the committee chooses, if a majority is reached.
The committee can ask parliament to make a decision on the matter in three ways: Urgent, prioritized or “time enough”.
– Urgency would mean that the accession treaty could be adopted as early as Friday, says Sonumut.
Harder to decide
If the case is given priority status, a decision could be made either at the end of the year or at the beginning of the next.
However, the last variant is most likely, according to Guldener Sonumut. Then it is more difficult to determine when the decision is taken up by parliament. It does, however, give the National Assembly the opportunity to wait for a go-ahead from the United States on a sale of the F-16 fighter jet.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently stated that he and US President Joe Biden discussed a deal where Turkey says yes to Sweden’s application in exchange for the US saying yes to the F-16.