Sweden’s refusal to investigate the Erdoğan image “absurd”: Çavuşoğlu
ANKARA
A Swedish prosecutor’s refusal to investigate the incident, in which a puppet in the likeness of President Tayyip Erdoğan was hanged in Stockholm, was “absurd”, Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on 17 January.
The Swedish prosecutor’s decision not to investigate the incident is “extremely absurd. We all know what the rule of law means,” Çavuşoğlu said at a joint press conference with his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir Abdollahian.
The “provocative” incident against Erdoğan was a “racist, hateful act of hate crime” and is therefore also against universal values and is a crime under international law, the minister said.
Sweden should not try to deceive Turkey by identifying the incident as freedom of expression, the minister said.
“If they think that Sweden is distracting us with word games, we would like to say that they are only fooling themselves,” Çavuşoğlu said.
Çavuşoğlu referred to the trilateral memorandum signed by Sweden, Finland and Turkey that envisages the Nordic countries’ membership in NATO if they meet requests from Ankara to address terrorist threats.
“When you look at Sweden’s testimony in the memorandum, they have a promise to fight them [terrorists]? Yes it has them. secondly, we are talking about freedom of expression. Is this attack, this provocation, a racist attack? Yes,” he stated.
The minister continued, Sweden will “either fall victim to the mines laid by terrorists, or we will all move forward by considering our security and fulfilling the commitments in the memorandum. The decision here is up to Sweden.”
Sweden and Finland abandoned their long-standing policy of military non-alignment and applied for membership in the military alliance after Russian forces launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February.
NATO member Turkey has not yet approved their accession, which requires unanimous approval from all existing alliance members.
PKK supporters gathered in front of the historic city hall in the capital Stockholm on January 11, hanging a doll resembling Erdoğan at its feet and sharing video footage of the moment on social media linked to the group.
On January 12, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Sweden’s ambassador in Ankara to protest against the demonstration in Stockholm.