Washington: The Biden administration has decided not to invite NATO allies Turkey and Hungary to next week's democracy summit, according to three US officials familiar with the decision. Foreign Policy magazine made the announcement on Thursday.

The two countries were also excluded from the inaugural edition of the summit last year, which Biden praised as one of his most important foreign policy achievements, despite the fact that it was held only twice.

A State Department official confirmed that everyone attending the 2021 summit had received invitations for this year's event, apart from a few changes.

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The Biden administration, he continued, "has no interest in this event being seen as a sweeping judgment on the strength of another country's democracy."

Although Turkey is "an important NATO ally and an incredibly important partner of the United States," Rob Barshinsky, senior director for human rights and democracy at the National Security Council, told Al-Monitor that Washington "has been pretty clear about it." " assessment of the state of democracy and human rights within the country," meaning that it was declining.

The decision to remove Sweden from the list again was probably influenced by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's announcement last week that his country would start ratifying Finland's NATO membership, but not Sweden's.

Erdogan emphasized that Stockholm's refusal to hand over more than 210 alleged terrorists in Turkish custody was a deal-breaker, even though he did not rule out adding Sweden to the military alliance.

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Hungary, which Biden famously characterized as "authoritarian" in 2020, has lost favor with NATO allies after the European Union refused to support the toughest sanctions against the Russian oil and petrol sector.

Budapest has repeatedly stressed that an embargo would do much more harm to Hungary and other European countries than punish Moscow for the conflict in Ukraine because about 80% of its natural gas comes from Russia.

Earlier this week, the Hungarian prime minister's office reiterated calls for a ceasefire in Ukraine and condemned Britain's choice to deliver depleted uranium ammunition to Kiev. Hungary has expressed support for Finland and Sweden joining NATO, but the country's opposition to allowing Ukraine to join the EU will not change unless changes are made regarding the use of EU languages in Ukraine. "Basic human rights norms are not complied with". The PM's office told reporters on Thursday.

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The Summit for Democracy will take place in Washington from March 28 to 30, along with partner countries Zambia, South Korea and Costa Rica.