Turkey approves Finland to join NATO.

Turkish President Erdogan said on 17 that Turkey recognized Finland's efforts to join NATO and decided to start the relevant procedures for approving Finland's accession to NATO.

Erdogan said at a joint press conference with visiting Finnish President Ninisto in Ankara on the same day that Turkey has noticed that Finland has made substantial progress in seeking to join NATO recently, Finland has met Turkey's requirements for its own security concerns, and Turkey has decided to start the relevant procedures for approving Finland's accession to the Treaty.

Erdogan also said that he asked Sweden to extradite 120 people to Turkey, but Sweden has never been able to do so, which is also the reason why Turkey can't push Sweden to join NATO. Ninisto welcomed Erdogan's decision and said that Finland still hopes to see Sweden join NATO. Without Sweden, Finland will not formally become a member of NATO.

NATO member states:

As of April 4th, 2023, NATO has 3 1 member countries: Belgium, Iceland, Denmark, Germany, France, Netherlands, Canada, Luxembourg, USA, Norway, Portugal, Turkey, Spain, Greece, Italy, Britain, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Slovenia.

Headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. On July 5, 2022, local time, NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg, Finnish Foreign Minister haavisto and Swedish Foreign Minister Linde formally signed the protocol of Finland and Sweden's accession to NATO at the NATO headquarters in Brussels. According to the procedure, the protocol will then be submitted to the existing 30 NATO member States for ratification. On March 27th, 2023, the Hungarian Parliament approved Finland to join NATO.