NATO formally invites Finland and Sweden to become members, moving closer ending their historic neutrality and defying Putin

NATO invited Sweden and Finland to join in a blow to Putin.

NATO agreed to sign the Accession Protocols in order to invite Finland and Sweden to become members.

The two countries made significant progress in joining the western military alliance on Tuesday, as Turkey dropped its objections to their membership and NATO announced that the three countries signed an agreement to let the membership process go forward.

There are more steps that need to be taken before they can join. NATO Secretary General Jen Stoltenberg said that the agreement paves the way for the two Nordic countries to join the alliance.

If a country wants to join NATO, they are usually invited to begin talks with the bloc about any reforms they need to make, and then invited to join the Membership Action Plan, which NATO describes as a programme which helps nations prepare for possible future membership.

NATO's current members need the approval of their parliaments to join.

He said he was confident that the two nations would join.

Some of the steps that countries normally go through may be hurried as a result of Stoltenberg's offer to speed up their membership efforts.

It is unclear if recent talks between NATO and the two nations about their joining may cover the necessary pre-membership talks NATO normally has with candidate countries.

Tuesday's agreement was a big step in the membership efforts of Sweden and Finns.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlt avuolu signed the agreement with the other foreign ministers.

NATO's current members need to agree to allow two countries to join.

Turkey had accused the countries of supporting Kurds.

"Turkey has made significant gains in the fight against terrorist organizations" and that "Turkey got what it wanted" by the signing of the security pact on Tuesday, according to a statement by the Turkish president.

NATO's secretary general said that Sweden agreed to increase the amount of work it did to extradite suspected terrorists to Turkey.

After Russia invaded Ukraine, Sweden and Finland became NATO members. In May, they applied to join.

The growth of NATO is not what Putin wants.

He tried to justify his invasion of Ukraine by saying that he was reacting to the possibility of NATO expanding eastwards, but instead he has caused attempts to expand NATO.