Sweden: Erdogan image “act of sabotage” against NATO’s bid
ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson on Friday condemned a protest by Kurds in central Stockholm where a picture of Turkey’s president was hung from a lamppost as an act of sabotage against Sweden’s bid to join NATO.
The protest outside city hall on Wednesday drew an angry backlash from Turkey, a NATO member that had already held off on approving Sweden’s application to become part of the western military alliance until the government in Stockholm meets its demands.
The speaker of Turkey’s parliament, Mustafa Sentop, canceled a visit by Andreas Norlen, the speaker of the Swedish parliament, which was scheduled for Monday, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported. Turkish lawmakers must ratify Sweden’s NATO application for the Nordic nation to become a member,
Turkey has made its approval conditional about Stockholm cracking down on Kurdish militants and other groups that Ankara considers a threat to national security. On Thursday, the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the Swedish ambassador over the Stockholm demonstration.
Kristersson condemned the image. He told TV4 on Friday that it was “extremely serious” to stage a “mock execution of a foreign democratically elected leader” in a country where two leading politicians have been assassinated. Sweden’s Prime Minister Olof Palme was murdered in 1986 and Foreign Minister Anna Lindh was stabbed to death in 2003.
– I would say that this is sabotage against the Swedish NATO application, Kristersson said. “It is dangerous for Swedish security to act in this way.”
Pictures posted on social media showed a mannequin resembling Erdogan hanging upside down. A group calling itself the Swedish Solidarity Committee for Rojava claimed it was behind the protest. Rojava is a Kurdish name for northern and eastern Syria.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, and affiliated Kurdish groups in Syria “lay mines on the path to Sweden’s NATO membership.”
“It is Sweden’s decision whether they want to clear these mines or deliberately step on them,” he said in an interview with Turkish state broadcaster TRT.
Alarmed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Sweden and Finland dropped their long-standing policy of military non-alignment and applied to join NATO in May. All 30 member states must agree to admit the two Nordic neighbors into the security organization.
The Turkish government has pressured Finland and Sweden to crack down on groups it considers terrorist organizations and to extradite people suspected of terror-related crimes. Cavusoglu said last month that Sweden was not even “halfway” in addressing his country’s concerns.
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Olsen reported from Copenhagen.