Hungary's parliament approved Finland's bid to become a NATO member Monday.
A large majority of lawmakers — 182 votes for versus six against — approved the accession of the Nordic country into the military alliance.
The vote means that 29 out of 30 NATO member state parliaments have ratified Finland's accession, with the last — Turkish Parliament— expected to also give Helsinki the nod next month.
"Thank you for the decision with clear numbers!" said Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin on Twitter after the vote.
NATO's expansion into Finland — a country with a 1,340 kilometers (830 miles) border with Russia — will roughly double the length of the bloc's current frontier with its Cold War-era foe. Prior to the application, public support for NATO membership had remained steady at 20-30% for two decades, but a February poll suggested 82% were happy with the decision to join the alliance.
A Swedish poll in January had 63% of Swedes in favor of being members.
Finland had initially aimed to join together with fellow NATO aspirant Sweden — a Nordic power facing a litany of disputes with Türkiye that ultimately sunk its chance to join the bloc before an alliance summit in Vilnius in July.
"The NATO membership of Finland and Sweden will strengthen the security of the whole Alliance," said Marin.
"It is in everyone's interest that Sweden also becomes a member of NATO before the Vilnius Summit," she said.
Helsinki and Stockholm ended decades of military nonalignment and decided to join the world's most powerful defense alliance in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Their applications were accepted at a June 2022 NATO summit but the bids still needed to be ratified by all alliance member parliaments — a process that stalled once it reached Türkiye and Hungary.
Budapest insisted it supports both Nordic nations' NATO accession but complained that they had unfairly criticized Hungarian government policy.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has said he had urged Türkiye and Hungary to ratify both applications.
A vote on Sweden's bid has not yet been scheduled in Budapest.
Prime Minister Viktor Orban's chief political aide said on Twitter Sunday the government-backed Sweden's NATO membership and "now it's up to the parliament to make a decision."
"Some MPs are concerned because of Swedish government officials making a habit of constantly questioning the state of Hungarian democracy, thereby insulting our voters, MPs & the country as a whole," Balazs Orban, who is not related to the prime minister, tweeted.
Fidesz said it will decide about backing Sweden's admission to the military alliance at a later date.
Last week, Orban's chief-of-staff Gergely Gulyas told reporters the Swedish bid will likely be ratified during the ongoing parliamentary session which runs until June 15.
Last June, Türkiye and the two Nordic countries signed a memorandum to address Ankara’s legitimate security concerns, paving the way for their eventual membership in the alliance. But recent provocative demonstrations by terrorist sympathizers and Islamophobic figures in Stockholm have led Turkish leaders to question Sweden’s commitment to take the steps necessary to gain NATO membership.
Ankara has long criticized Stockholm for housing members of various terrorist organizations, particularly members of the PKK and, in recent years, the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) – the organization behind the 2016 defeated coup attempt in Türkiye.
Ahead of a historic NATO summit, the three countries signed a trilateral deal in June that prevented a Turkish veto. In the memorandum, the Nordic countries said they would address Türkiye’s extradition requests for terrorists.
In addition, the joint directive states that Finland and Sweden 'will not provide support to ... the organization described as FETÖ' and terrorist groups."
Negotiations between the countries were temporarily suspended in early 2023 after protests – involving both the burning of the Quran and a mock hanging of an effigy of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan – were staged in Stockholm.
On the other side, Erdoğan recently approved Finland’s NATO accession bill and sent it to Parliament for ratification. On Thursday, Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Commission approved the bill that will eventually pave the way for Finland’s membership.
