ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Sweden’s public radio broadcast, Sveriges Radio, announced on Wednesday that it would stop three foreign language services, including Kurdish, in order to cut costs.
Sveriges Radio CEO Cilla Benko in a statement said that the changes to the radio’s services were part of measures to save 225 million SEK, just under $22 million.
The Kurdish service started its broadcast about 23 years ago, on January 6th, 2001, and has broadcasted in both Sorani and Kurmanci dialects. The service has four permanent journalists and four other contributors.
"I look at the Kurdish service as a child that I have given birth to," the Kurdish news presenter Nasser Sina told the radio on Wednesday as they announced the plans to stop the service.
He was the first to go on air when the service started.
"But now I feel like that child is dying in front of my eyes," he said.
The service is scheduled to go off air on March 31st, 2024, about 10 days after Newroz, the Kurdish New Year.
The radio said 100 staff members have been made redundant while 80 others voluntarily decided to leave the radio services.
Nishtman Irandoust, one of the Kurdish journalists, told Rudaw the public broadcaster would reduce its expenditure, but also said some believe the motive could be political.
Sweden has a large and politically active Kurdish population. Turkey has for long pressured the Swedish government to clamp down on the Kurdish diaspora in the country.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has repeatedly accused Sweden of harboring and supporting groups including the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and sought the extradition of alleged PKK members in exchange for opening the door to NATO.
Last week, Ankara ratified Sweden’s ascension into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) military alliance, after over a year of stalling the process.
Unanimous approval by alliance members is required in order for new countries to join NATO and Turkey used this as leverage to pressure Stockholm and Helsinki to take action against Kurdish groups it considers “terrorists.”
Irandoust said some believe Sweden decided to end the Kurdish broadcast in order to appease Ankara and in exchange for its support to join NATO.
Sveriges Radio will celebrate its 100th anniversary next year. It said they will also stop their Tigrinya and Russian services in late March.
