ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The newly-elected Swedish government will retain the same position as its predecessor regarding ongoing negotiations with Turkey on its application to join NATO, the country's first deputy parliament speaker told Rudaw on Tuesday.
Sweden and Finland launched their bids to join the US-led military alliance earlier this year following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, rolling back on their longstanding policies of military neutrality. Their bids were dealt a blow by Turkey, a member of the alliance, who accused the Nordic countries of harboring Kurdish groups designated as terrorists in the country.
"The agreement between Sweden, Finland, and Turkey should be upheld ... in accordance with different international regulations and EU regulations. So far, there are no changes," First Deputy Speaker of the Swedish Parliament (Riksdag) Kenneth Forslund told Rudaw's Hawraz Gulpi, adding that Sweden's new right-wing prime minister has requested to meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the matter, pending an invitation.
According to a memorandum signed in July between Ankara, Stockholm, and Helsinki, the Nordic countries will address Turkey's requests for the
extradition of suspected members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and the Fethullah Gulen movement. They must also not provide any form of support to northeast Syria's (Rojava) Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its military arm – the People's Protection Units (YPG) – which Turkey alleges are the PKK's Syrian proxies.
"The newly elected foreign minister has said that Sweden stands firm on its traditional positions and that the PKK is regarded as a terrorist organization since 1984 in Sweden," Forslund stated.
The PKK is a Kurdish armed group fighting for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey and designated as a terrorist organization by Ankara, who has launched successive operations against the group and its proxies domestically and southward in Iraq and Syria.
Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom on Tuesday said that the new Swedish government was committed to addressing Turkey's requests, telling AFP that Stockholm supported Ankara and the EU's stance on the PKK and calling the Kurdish armed group "terrorist through and through."
"We will be able to fulfill the memorandum and its items. I'm quite sure of that," Billstrom said, referring to the memorandum signed in Madrid in June.
Erdogan in early October reiterated his warnings that Turkey will not sign off on the two countries' NATO application until they uphold Ankara's demands.
The Nordic countries' ascension to the security and military alliance has received strong backing, with all of NATO's 30 allies bar Turkey and Hungary ratifying their membership.
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