Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has suggested that Ankara may agree to Finland joining NATO but not Sweden.
He criticized Sweden’s refusal to extradite dozens of people allegedly linked to Kurdish militant groups and other critics of his government.
“If you want to join NATO at all, you will return these terrorists to us,” Mr. Erdogan said.
His comments came days after Turkey suspended talks to accept the two Nordic countries as members.
The move was prompted by a series of controversial protests in Stockholm, during one of which a copy of the Holy Quran was burned.
Swedish authorities have condemned the protests but defended the country’s freedom of expression laws.
In response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Sweden and Finland applied to join NATO last year, ending decades of military non-alignment.
Their request must be approved unanimously by all current NATO members, but Turkey and Hungary have failed to ratify their bids.
In his speech, Mr Erdogan suggested that Turkey could now “react differently to Finland”, adding that “Sweden will be shocked”.
“We gave Sweden a list of 120 people and asked them to hand over these terrorists to their country,” Mr. Erdogan said. “Sorry about that if you don’t hand them over.”
Sweden has more Kurdish residents than Finland and is in heated talks with Ankara over NATO membership.
Turkey has called on Sweden to distance itself from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which Turkey, the United States and the European Union consider a terrorist group.
In response, Sweden approved a constitutional amendment allowing it to enact tougher anti-terrorism laws as demanded by Turkey.
Both Sweden and Finland have also lifted a ban on the sale of military equipment to Turkey, which was introduced after Ankara’s military intervention in Syria in 2019.
But Turkey has sharply criticized Sweden over recent protests in Stockholm, including a Kurdish support group hanging an effigy of Mr Erdogan from a lamp post.
Earlier this month, Mr Erdogan said Turkey’s elections had been brought back by a month to May 14.
Helsinki’s Foreign Minister Pekka Havastu has since suggested that the growing ballot “pressure” has “heated” the talks inside Turkey and that the talks should be put on hold.
The diplomat also insisted that his country should join alongside Sweden – appearing to back away from his earlier proposal that Finland be forced to join without its Nordic neighbour. can
