Sweden's extradition to Türkiye last week of a convicted PKK terrorist is a "good start," but Stockholm needs to do more before Ankara can approve its NATO membership, Turkish Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ said on Monday.
Sweden on Friday deported Turkish citizen Mahmut Tat, who had sought asylum in Sweden in 2015 after being sentenced in Türkiye to six years and 10 months in jail for links to the PKK terrorist group.
"This is a good start from Sweden that shows their sincerity and goodwill. We hope new (extraditions) will follow in line with this sincerity," Bozdağ said in a televised interview with state broadcaster TRT Haber.
However, he made clear that Türkiye expected further moves from Stockholm before it could ratify Sweden's NATO application.
"In line with the trilateral memorandum with Sweden and Finland, they should lift all (arms) embargoes on Türkiye, change their legislation for the fight against terrorism, and extradite all terrorists that Türkiye wants. All of these conditions should not be reduced to merely extraditions," Bozdağ said.
A Turkish court on Saturday jailed the convicted member of the PKK terrorist group a day after Sweden extradited him.
The move comes as the powerful NATO member continues to hold up Sweden and Finland’s bids to join the military alliance, pressing for the two Nordic countries to extradite convicted and suspected terrorists to Türkiye.
After Russia invaded Ukraine, Finland and Sweden in May dropped decades of military non-alignment and sought to join NATO. That requires a consensus within the U.S.-led defense alliance, but Türkiye and Hungary have so far not ratified their membership.
Türkiye has demanded the Nordic countries take a tougher stance on terrorist groups in exchange for its backing.
Türkiye has accused Finland and Sweden in particular of providing a haven for PKK terrorist group members and held back on ratifying their NATO bids as the Nordic countries have not yet fulfilled their side of an agreement in Madrid in June.
The Turkish foreign minister said last week that some progress had been made but "concrete steps" were still needed to win Türkiye’s approval.
Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu held trilateral talks with his Swedish and Finnish counterparts on the margins of a NATO meeting in Bucharest last week.
"The statements (coming out of Sweden) are good, the determination is good, but we need to see concrete steps," Çavuşoğlu said.
Ankara has said it expects Stockholm to take action on issues including the extradition of criminals and freezing of terrorist assets.
Swedish Migration Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard meanwhile stressed that Tat’s extradition was a decision taken by the Scandinavian country’s migration board and courts, and not by the government.
"This is an extradition case where an individual has had his asylum application rejected," Malmer Stenergard told Swedish broadcaster SVT, adding: "The government has no role in this process that concerns reviews of asylum applications."
"That means neither the government nor an individual Cabinet minister can intervene or influence relevant authorities or courts in their handling of individual cases," she claimed.
It remains to be seen how Sweden will implement its promises under the trilateral agreement.
When Sweden and Finland dropped their longstanding policies of military nonalignment and applied for NATO membership in May, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan promptly said his country would not accept them and called out the two Nordic countries of turning a blind eye to terrorism. Any decision on NATO enlargement requires approval by all alliance members.
Ahead of a historic NATO summit, the three countries signed a joint memorandum in June that prevented a Turkish veto. In the memorandum, the Nordic countries said they would address Türkiye’s extradition requests for people Ankara deems terrorists. Sweden and Finland said they "confirm" the PKK is a terrorist organization and promised "to not provide support" to its Syrian affiliate YPG. They also lifted an arms embargo on Türkiye that was imposed following its 2019 Syria operation against the PKK/YPG.
Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson visited Türkiye last month and pledged to work toward countering terrorism threats to Türkiye.
The Parliaments of Türkiye and Hungary have yet to ratify the NATO applications. The 28 other NATO states have already done so.
Turkish officials, including President Erdoğan, have warned that Türkiye will not give the nod to the memberships of Sweden and Finland until the memorandum is implemented.