The U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the President Joe Biden-led administration believes that Turkey should be provided with upgraded F-16 fighters "as soon as possible" as it woos Ankara to back Sweden’s NATO membership.
What Happened: Blinken on Tuesday made the comments at a joint media conference in Sweden's Lulea with Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson as he argued that the "time is now" for Ankara to drop its objections to Sweden joining NATO, reported the Associated Press.
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The state secretary's remarks came after President Biden on Monday, in a call with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan implicitly linked the two issues.
"I spoke to Erdogan, and he still wants to work on something on the F-16s. I told him we wanted a deal with Sweden. So let's get that done," Biden said.
Despite the president's comments, Blinken maintained that the administration had not linked the two issues. However, he added that "Both of these are vital, in our judgment, to European security."
"We believe that both should go forward as quickly as possible; that is to say, Sweden's accession and moving forward on the F-16 package more broadly," Blinken said.
Blinken declined to predict when the only other NATO member, Turkey, and Hungary, would grant their approval. "We have no doubt that it can be, it should be, and we expect it to be," he added.
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Why It Matters: After Russia invaded Ukraine last year, Sweden and Finland reversed decades of hesitation and formally applied to join NATO.
However, the decision-making process requires unanimous agreement, and Turkey has utilized its influence to press for certain conditions regarding the presence of Kurdish militants in the Nordic nations.
As a result, while Finland successfully joined NATO last month, Ankara continues to block Sweden’s accession.
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