Hans Wallmark, foreign policy spokesperson for the opposition Moderate Party, told the TT newswire that he expected an announcement to be made after  the fifth meeting of the cross-party security policy analysis group, which is helping draw up the government’s new analysis of the changed security situation. 

However, no announcement was made, and a press conference foreign minister Ann Linde had called for 5pm, was cancelled at short notice. 

Wallmark said he was pushing for the analysis to be be submitted as a written statement to parliament when it is published on May 13th, in a similar way to that in which the Finnish government’s analysis was last month. 

The submission could then be followed by a parliamentary debate in which all parties would be able to propose motions. 

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“There must be some possibility for parliament to be heard,” he told Sweden’s TT newswire. “This is a shift in position which deserves a broad and frank debate which the Swedish people are given the possibility to follow.”

Mikael Oscarsson, defence spokesperson for the Christian Democrats agreed that parliamentary backing should be secured for the decision to join Nato. 

“This is a big and important step, after all,” he said, saying it was not enough for the Social Democrat party to shift position on the issues. 

The ‘Sossarna’ [Social Democrats] are not the same the thing as Sweden,” he said. 

The Sweden Democrats are also calling for the Nato decision to be backed by the parliament. 

“If you want to establish national unity and as much responsibility for this as possible, then you want to get the backing of parliament and also have an open parliamentary debate,” the party’s foreign policy spokesperson, Aron Emilsson, said.