Sweden is extradited with alleged terrorism links to Turkey’s media
ANKARA, Dec 3 (Reuters) – Sweden on Friday extradited a Kurdish man with alleged links to terrorism to Turkey as Ankara continues to pressure the Nordic country to meet its demands in exchange for NATO membership, Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency reported on Saturday.
Mahmut Tat had sought asylum in Sweden in 2015 after being sentenced in Turkey to six years and ten months for alleged links to the Kurdish militant group PKK.
Turkish state broadcaster TRT said Tat was sent to a prison in Istanbul on Saturday. Swedish authorities were not immediately available for comment.
Sweden and Finland applied in May to join NATO in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but ran into objections from Turkey, which accused the two countries of harboring militants from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and other groups.
Turkey said on Wednesday that Sweden and Finland had made progress towards NATO membership but still needed to do more to meet Ankara’s demands to fight terrorism.
Others wanted by Ankara are people with alleged links to Fethullah Gulen – a Turkish cleric who lives in the US and is accused of orchestrating the 2016 failed coup attempt against Erdogan.
Stockholm and Helsinki deny harboring militants but have pledged to work with Ankara to fully address its security concerns and also to lift the arms embargo.
NATO makes its decisions by consensus, which means that both countries require approval from all 30 countries. Only Turkey is still against the two countries’ membership.
Reporting by Ece Toksabay Editing by Ros Russell
Our standards: Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.