Stockholm is feeling the heat from Turkey’s President Recep Teyep Erdogan, who’s now drawn a very hard line on Swedish NATO membership, suggesting it may never happen.
He criticised Sweden’s refusal to extradite 120 people allegedly tied to Kurdish militant groups and other opponents of his government.
Ties have soured over the past week after a controversial protests here in Stockholm, where one copy of the Koran was burned.
Swedish officials have condemned the protests, but defended the country’s free speech laws.
And previously, they approved a constitutional amendment which allows it to create tougher anti-terror laws demanded by Turkey.
It has 8.5 months since Sweden launched a bid to join NATO – together with Finland – as a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This ended decades of deliberate military non-alignment.
Finland does appear to have a provisional green light from Turkey.
President Erdogan suggested this was the case in those same comments.
Finland has also signalled it may be ready to move ahead with its bid, and “decouple” from Sweden.
It’s also been announced that Finland’s Prime Minister will take meetings this week, with separation of the joint application likely high on the agenda.
