DTurkey summoned the Swedish ambassador after a doll of the Turkish president was hung from a lamppost in front of Stockholm City Hall. The incident had already occurred on Wednesday and initially attracted little attention in Sweden. Video footage shows a doll wearing a mask from Recep Erdogan dangling in the wind; only a few people can be seen on the recordings. Taking to Twitter, a Kurdish group called the Rojava Committee of Sweden accused themselves of the crime, writing alongside the video of the doll hanging upside down, showing history how dictators often ended. The activists compared Erdogan with Benito Mussolini.
Sweden’s Foreign Minister Tobias Billström distanced himself from the fact. On Thursday, Billström wrote on Twitter: The Swedish government protects open debate but rejects threats and hatred against political representatives. “The depiction of an executed president-elect outside City Hall is unfortunate.”
Debate about NATO accession intensified
According to the Reuters news agency, Turkey summoned the Swedish ambassador on Thursday. The Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs therefore confirmed the process without specifying what was discussed. In the evening, Reuters quoted Turkish government circles as saying that the expectation was that the perpetrators of the incident would be identified and that Sweden would keep its promises.
The incident is likely to exacerbate the dispute over Sweden’s bid to join NATO. Sweden applied for NATO membership together with Finland in May, but Hungary and Turkey are the only NATO countries that have not yet ratified the enlargement. Hungary held out the prospect of early ratification. However, Turkey is calling on Sweden to take stronger action against “terrorists”, most notably members of the banned Kurdish terrorist organization PKK. Erdogan accuses Sweden of supporting terrorist organizations and demands the extradition of at least 40 “terrorists”, including many former asylum seekers, many of whom are now Swedish citizens.
Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson had been accommodating for a long time and traveled to Ankara shortly after his election. At the weekend, however, he said that Turkey was making “demands that we cannot meet”.
In Sweden, it is assumed that Turkey will try at least until the parliamentary and presidential elections in June to tie its approval of NATO accession to concessions made by Sweden. According to Stockholm, ratification may not be expected until autumn.