Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson in Sälen, Sweden January 8, 2023. TT NEWS AGENCY/VIA Portal
It has been more than half a year since Sweden and Finland applied for NATO membership. And if Hungary, as the twenty-ninth of the thirty member states of the alliance, could ratify the accession protocol of the two Nordic countries in February, there is no indication that Turkey will give the green light anytime soon. On the contrary: While Stockholm has expressed its frustration in the past few days, Ankara reacted violently on Friday, January 13th.
Turkey has canceled the long-planned visit of the President of the Swedish Parliament, Andreas Norlén, for Tuesday 17 January. The Turkish authorities did not welcome the action of Kurdish sympathizers on January 11 in front of Stockholm City Hall. There, a mannequin with the likeness of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan hung from a lamppost by his feet. The next day, the Swedish ambassador in Ankara, Staffan Herrström, was called to the Foreign Ministry to explain what Turkey considers a “provocation”.
“These are the PKK terrorists [Parti des travailleurs du Kurdistan] challenge the Swedish government in the heart of Stockholm is proof that the Swedish authorities have not taken the necessary measures against terrorism,” Turkish Presidency Communications Director Fahrettin Altun responded to this action on Twitter the next day. According to the Turkish news agency Anadolu, the public prosecutor’s office in Ankara has launched an investigation into “criminal provocation”.
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From the northern Swedish city of Kiruna, where he received members of the European Commission on Friday, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson spoke of a “very serious” crime. “Any country would think showing what looks like the execution of a foreign leader is repugnant. Even more so in a country that has twice seen leading politicians assassinated,” he added, citing the assassination of Prime Minister Olof Palme in 1986 and Foreign Secretary Anna Lindh in 2003.
Mr Kristersson also assured that he “understands Turkey’s anger” and reiterated that Sweden would have reacted in the same way. But he also denounced a “sabotage maneuver” by pro-Kurdish militants with the aim of “preventing Sweden and Finland from joining NATO”.
balancing exercise
This incident is all the more problematic for Stockholm as it allows Turkey to justify its intransigent position towards Sweden, causing growing despair in the Scandinavian kingdom. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Çavusoglu, who received his Swedish counterpart Tobias Billstrom in Ankara on December 21 and 22, assessed that Stockholm had barely met “half” of his country’s demands.
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