It sounds like it's going through because Sweden and Turkey have worked together to address legitimate concerns about Turkish national security? But I don't see any mention of the EU talks; the article neither dismissing them nor addressing them at all (unless I'm just dumb right now and have mis-read something). So I'm still wondering if those talks are "off the table", or if someone could please correct me about my misunderstandings

[–] variaatio@sopuli.xyz 6 points 1 year ago

Nah. Sweden doesn't seem to have given any firm commitments about security beyond "We work on it together", which can mean exactly as little or as much it fancies Sweden after they are in NATO.

To me this is simply "Erdogan has decided he has seen this bargaining to completion and it would look really bad, if this thing wasn't resolved by Vilnius. Pressure started to mount with This is starting to be embarrassing Recep from rest of NATO" and he simply called it good.

Nothing needs to have been changed on this exact moment, He just decided he has tried long enough and has exhausted the concessions and no point dragging it on. Instead of benefit, it started to be more hindrance in his calculation to keep this going.

He can now tan in the limelight in Vilnius as the leader who saved the situation at last minute. Mind you the problem was of his own creation, but hey those are the best kind of problems. You have exact control and can "solve the problem" at exactly the most suitable last minute moment. Actual problems are harder for "last minute saviour" credibility collection. You might actually fail to solve the problem and thats not good.

[–] barsoap@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago

Talks weren't suspended because the EU hates Turkey (national politics and sentiment nonwithstanding Berlaymont just doesn't care about those things) but because the accession procedure went nowhere, and in some areas backslided.

As such reopening is contingent on nothing but Turkey actually taking its prospect of joining seriously. I wonder if Erdogan understands that "Sweden reinvigorating Turkey's application" pretty much means Sweden giving Turkey private lessons in how to be less of a shithole... in any case it doesn't surprise me that Sweden agreed to such language.

[–] MrShankles@reddthat.com 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I saw this from today, mentioning paving the way for Turkey to join the EU, as well as the US selling their F-16's to Turkey.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/10/nato-sweden-pm-to-meet-with-turkeys-erdogan-in-last-ditch-bid-to-seal-membership

I think the US congress would veto Biden's approval (or already has), if I'm reading correctly? But I can't find any follow-up as to what actually made the deal go through.

I also wonder if the EU is going to reopen talks about Turkey joining. But seems like Sweden has also done a lot of legwork already to jibe with Turkish security concerns, so maybe that was enough? I'm curious too

[–] TheGod@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago

EU will never seriously want turkey to be member. They will only pretend if necessary.

EU doesnt want another Orban and Polish right wing governments blocking every single decision