The Swedish Left Party is losing favor over support for the terrorist group PKK
Sweden’s left-wing party, which opposed Stockholm’s decision to apply for NATO membership, has reportedly lost votes because of its support for the terrorist organization PKK’s Syrian branch, the YPG.
In the last general election on September 11, the Socialist Party received 1.3 points fewer votes than it did in the previous election four years ago, mainly because of its support for the PKK/YPG and its objections to sending arms to Ukraine in its war against Russia, according to local sources.
The party received 8 percent in the 2018 election, which dropped to 6.7 percent in 2022, the Left Party’s deputy secretary Hanna Gedin told TT on Tuesday.
Gedin explained that the party attributes its decline to two reasons: They oppose the government sending weapons to Ukraine and that their politicians waving PKK flags in the city of Visby has negatively affected the voting results.
Posing with terrorist flags
On July 7 this year, photos were circulated on social media showing Left Party MPs Daniel Riazat, Momodou Malcolm Jallow and Lorena Delgado Varas posing with flags of the PKK, which is listed as a terrorist organization in Turkey, the US and the EU.
Then Sweden’s Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson condemned the parliamentarians for openly posing with terrorist symbols.
– The PKK is a designated terrorist organization, not only in Sweden but in the EU, and posing with such flags is extremely inappropriate, Andersson told TT.
Andersson’s then Minister of Justice and the Interior, Morgan Johansson, also took to Twitter to call the left-wing politicians’ behavior “unacceptable”.
“The PKK has the blood of countless innocents on its hands. It was recognized as a terrorist organization in 1984 by Olaf Palme’s government,” Johansson said, urging the Left Party to “abandon” its PKK protests.
NATO’s problem
Sweden is under pressure from Turkey about its protection of such groups as it tries to join NATO with its Nordic neighbor Finland. The two countries reversed decades of military non-alignment by applying for NATO membership in mid-May.
Türkiye, a NATO member for over 70 years, has withheld its ratification of their accession, which requires unanimous approval, and accuses the two of tolerating and even supporting terrorist groups. Ankara has repeatedly demanded that Nordic nations take a tougher stance against terrorism.
The sides signed a memorandum in June at a NATO summit to address the Turkish side’s security concerns, with Stockholm and Helsinki pledging “not to provide support” to the PKK or its Syrian affiliate the YPG. They also lifted an arms embargo against Türkiye that was imposed after its 2019 Syria operation against the PKK/YPG.
Sweden’s new prime minister, Ulf Kristersson, visited Turkey last month and promised to work to counter terrorist threats against Turkey.
Turkish officials, including President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, have warned that Turkey will not grant membership until the memorandum is implemented and “concrete measures” are taken, including the extradition of criminals and the freezing of terrorist assets.
Last, Sweden returned an alleged PKK member to Türkiyeas Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said was on the list of people Ankara wanted from Stockholm.
“It’s a good start but Sweden needs to do more before we can approve their NATO membership,” Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ said separately.
This week, Finnish Defense Minister Antti Kaikkonen is paying an official visit to Türkiye and meet Defense Minister Hulusi Akar on Thursday to discuss the trilateral NATO agreement.
