ISTANBUL/STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Turkish prosecutors opened a probe on Friday into an incident in Stockholm in which an effigy of President Tayyip Erdogan was strung up, state media said, adding further diplomatic strain in Sweden’s bid to win Turkey’s approval to join NATO.
Footage first shared on Twitter by the so-called Swedish Solidarity Committee for Rojava, referring to the Kurdish regions of Syria, showed an Erdogan effigy hung by its feet outside Stockholm city hall with a few people standing by.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told broadcaster TV4 on Friday that the act was “extremely serious” and he considered it a sabotage against the NATO application. Police said they had no knowledge of the incident until it was over.
NATO member Turkey summoned the Swedish ambassador on Thursday over the incident, which comes after months of efforts by Stockholm to win Ankara’s backing for the bid it began after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year.
Ankara has said Sweden needed to take a clearer stance against what it sees as terrorists, mainly Kurdish militants and the organization it blames for a 2016 coup attempt.
Turkish state-owned Anadolu news agency said the investigation was launched after Erdogan’s lawyer filed a legal petition.
“A criminal complaint has been filed with the Ankara chief public prosecutor’s office, demanding that an investigation be launched against the perpetrators,” the president’s lawyer Huseyin Aydin wrote on Twitter.
Echoing pro-government Turkish media that broadcast footage of the incident, Aydin said it was understood to have been organized by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which is designated as a terrorist organization.
Sweden and Finland signed a three-way agreement with Turkey last year aimed at overcoming Ankara’s objections to their NATO bids, which were made in May and require the approval of all 30 NATO member states.
Kristersson told TV4 “the risk is there” that the incident could affect the NATO process.