Sweden and Finland take a new step towards NATO membership
On Tuesday, Sweden and Finland will sign an accession protocol, the next step on their road to NATO membership.
On Tuesday, Sweden and Finland will sign accession protocols, the next step on their road to NATO membership.
The protocol will be signed today by the 30 member countries of the alliance in a ceremony in Brussels.
The foreign ministers of the two new member states are taking part in the historic event, along with representatives of the current members of NATO.
However, member states must also follow the protocol in their political systems, normally their national assemblies. It is a time-consuming process. According to the German news agency DPA, Sweden and Finland are expected to be full members of NATO in six to eight months.
The accession protocols could have been signed earlier but were delayed by Turkey’s opposition to the two countries’ NATO membership.
The historic decision to invite Sweden and Finland into NATO was taken at the alliance’s summit in Madrid last week – after Turkey agreed to lift its veto in exchange for a series of political concessions from the two states.
Source: © NTB Scanpix / #Norway Today / #NorwayTodayNews
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