Ahead of Ulf Kristersson’s meeting with Turkish President Erdogan on Tuesday, the government chooses to meet Turkey’s demands and is now distancing itself from the Kurdish militia in Syria, the YPG, and their political wing, the PYD party. The YPG has long been an ally of NATO and the United States in the fight against IS in Syria and has also previously been supported by Sweden.
– This is nothing new, but it is clearly stated in the tripartite agreement between Sweden, Finland and Turkey. We are very concerned about Turkey’s security and we fight all forms of security threats, says Kristersson.
But the organizations are not labeled as terrorists by either the EU or the US. However, the new government has chosen to move closer to Turkey’s line, which regards both Kurdish organizations as terrorists.
– We are not saying that they are terrorists, but we are just saying that we should not cooperate with organizations that are so close to the PKK, which they undoubtedly do anyway. What we want to emphasize is that we take the security problems very seriously – that we want to fight all types of terrorism and that the PKK is a terrorist organization. We have great understanding that Turkey is concerned, says Kristersson.
Watch the full interview in the player above.