Turkey says it seeks extradition of ‘terrorists’ from Sweden, Finland

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkey said on Wednesday it will renew demand from Sweden and Finland to extradite over 30 Turkish nationals who are wanted for alleged terror links but live in both Nordic countries which on Tuesday made compromises to Ankara in return of its support to for their NATO membership.

Weeks after both Sweden and Finland made bids to enter NATO following the Russia-Ukraine war, they finally reached an agreement with Turkey on Tuesday to support their membership in the security alliance which makes its decisions by consensus. Ankara had initially rejected the Scandinavian countries’ bids for their alleged support to Kurdish fighters.

NATO on Wednesday officially invited Sweden and Finland to become its members.

Turkey published a list of five demands in late May for Sweden and Finland in return of its support for their bids, including the extradition of “terrorists” who have links with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and its alleged Syrian offshoots - People’s Protection Units (YPG) and its political arm, Democratic Union Party (PYD) - as well as Fethullah Gulen - a Turkish cleric who lives in the US and is accused of orchestrating 2016 failed coup attempt against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Bekir Bozdag, Turkish justice minister, told reporters in Ankara on Wednesday that they will “remind” Sweden and Finland that Turkey expects them to extradite 33 people who are wanted by Turkish security forces for terror charges.

“The files are waiting: for six PKK members and six FETO members in Finland; 10 FETO and 11 PKK members in Sweden,” the minister was quoted by state media as saying, using a derogatory term for Gulen’s Hizmet Movement.

“After the memorandum, we will rewrite and remind about their extradition,” he added.

As per the memorandum, Sweden and Finland will address Turkey’s “pending deportation or extradition requests of terror suspects expeditiously,” according to Turkish state media. Both Nordic countries also agreed to refrain from supporting the PKK, PYD and YPG.

PKK is an armed group which claims to struggle for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey. It is designated as a terrorist organization by Ankara, US and the European Union. The YPG is the backbone of the US-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) which controls northeast Syria (Rojava).

The SDF has said it has not received any support from Sweden. However, Stockholm has supported the Kurdish administration in Syria politically by welcoming its officials at the foreign ministry building several times and providing indirect humanitarian support worth tens of millions of dollars. Ann Linde, Sweden’s foreign minister, told her Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu in 2020 that Turkey must withdraw from Rojava, angering him.

Elham Ahmed, president of the Executive Committee of the Syrian Democratic Council (SDC), the political wing of the SDF, told Russian state media in an interview aired earlier this month that they enjoy very good relations with Sweden.

Turkey says it seeks extradition of ‘terrorists’ from Sweden, Finland

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