The Prime Minister of Sweden’s new right-wing government, Ulf Kristersson, will meet Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey today. The core question of Tuesday’s negotiations is: will Sweden agree to extradite persons staying in Sweden, ‘s Nordic correspondent Pirjo Auvinen estimates.
8.11. 7:15•Updated 8.11. 10:13
STOCKHOLM Prime Minister and leader of the Moderate Coalition, Ulf Kristersson has prominently flagged Sweden’s NATO membership. In March, Kristersson announced (you will switch to another service)that if the right wins the September elections, he is ready to send Sweden’s NATO application as soon as the result is known.
However, Russia’s attack on Ukraine and Finland’s NATO application also got Sweden’s social democrats to support NATO membership already in May. Only the Greens and the Left Party oppose Sweden’s NATO membership.
But there are differences of degree in attitudes towards NATO, the change of power after the September elections has shown that.
Sweden’s social democrats announced in connection with their own NATO decision that the conditions are the same as Norway and Denmark used to be: no nuclear weapons and no permanent bases in Sweden. This dem leader and prime minister Magdalena Andersson also stated in mid-May in the Diet debate (you will switch to another service).
Therefore, especially in the ears of Sweden’s social democrats, the new coalition ministers, i.e. Prime Minister Kristersson, Foreign Minister Tobias Billström and the Minister of Defense Pål Jonson’s the interviews have been harsh to listen to.
During his visit to Finland the other week, Jonson said in an interview with that Sweden has no preconditions or reservations. Kristersson and Billström have also said the same.
And formally it is, because conditions or wishes regarding, for example, nuclear weapons or permanent bases are negotiated only after membership has been approved.
But interviews in recent weeks have shown that Kristersson’s government does not want reservations or conditions. Both the prime minister, the foreign minister and the defense minister appeal to Finland: Sweden is doing like Finland.
And as a surer guarantee Commander of the Defense Forces (you move to another service) Micael Bydén went public a week ago with his own recommendations for the new government. In his opinion, Sweden should not impose conditions or restrictions on, for example, nuclear weapons on Swedish soil.
It will be interesting to see how harshly criticized the Social Democrats are when the matter is discussed in the Diet. Spring’s exceptionally broad foreign policy unanimity may be put to the test.
The call to pick up Isis women and children from the camps
The change of power can also be seen in the attitude towards the NATO conditions set by Turkey.
In the Swedish radio’s Saturday interview (you will switch to another service) Foreign Minister Billström clearly outlined that Sweden’s attitude towards Kurdish organizations operating in Syria is stricter than the previous government, just like the President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has hoped.
It is about the Syrian Kurdish fighting organization YPG and its political branch PYD. In Erdogan’s opinion, the YPG and PYD are terrorist organizations similar to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, the PKK. For example, the EU list of terrorist organizations includes the PKK, but the YPG and PYD do not.
The line of the Social Democratic government was certainly influenced by the fact that it depended on one MP, a Kurdish Amineh Kakabaveh support. But the background could also be that the Syrian Kurds have fought against the terrorist organization Isis, which the West has only been happy about.
Now Kakabaveh is no longer in the Diet, and there is no need to care about his vote. But the policies of Sweden’s new foreign minister have also reached the ears of the Syrian Kurds.
Sapekas’ answer to Billström’s interview came right over the weekend In the news of Sweden’s TV4 (you switch to another service). PYD representative Shiyar Ali thinks that Sweden should remove its citizens from Isis camps controlled by the Kurds, if they once consider Kurdish organizations to be so unworthy.
Kristersson’s government has now agreed to Erdogan’s demands for condemning Kurdish organizations.
The core question of Tuesday’s negotiations is: is Sweden going to agree to hand over the persons staying in Sweden whose names are dozens on Erdoğan’s “terrorist list”?
Whose foreign policy?
There are three bourgeois parties in Sweden’s new government, i.e. the moderate coalition, the Christian Democrats and the liberals. It cooperates closely with the Sweden Democrats, a party outside the government.
Four parties wrote a seven-point plan during the weeks of the government negotiations of the Tidö contract (you switch to another service) about how to cooperate.
There is no mention of foreign and security policy in the agreement. According to the Sweden Democrats, it is clear that foreign policy is also decided between the four parties.
Foreign Minister Tobias Billström emphasized in a radio interview that foreign policy is decided by the governing parties. That means three instead of four.
The Social Democrats announced (you will switch to another service) in the last meters of the election campaign, the Sweden Democrats became unreliable in terms of foreign policy. One justification was that the chairman did not Jimmie Åkesson agreed to choose which superpower leader he liked better: Russia Vladimir Putin or the United States Joe Biden.
There were also doubts in newspaper stories (you switch to another service)that the United States will not give Sweden all intelligence information in the future, because the Swedish Democrats are not trusted.
Kristersson’s trip to Ankara, Turkey is not only a foreign policy test for himself, but also for the foreign policy of the new Swedish government.
You can discuss the topic until Wednesday 9 November. until 11 p.m.
Read more:
The meeting between Turkey’s Erdoğan and NATO’s Stoltenberg ended – no breakthrough in NATO talks
NATO increases pressure on Turkey – next week could be decisive, according to the researcher
Sweden’s new defense minister Pål Jonson visits Finland – He does not rule out the idea of a joint NATO base between the two countries
Sweden’s new prime minister travels to Turkey to negotiate NATO membership