Turkey cancels Swedish minister visit over right-wing protest - Al Jazeera English

Sweden’s defence ministry gave Swedish-Danish politician Rasmus Paludan, from the far-right Stram Kurs (Hard Line) party, permission to stage the rally on Saturday, during which he said he intended to “burn the Quran”, Islam’s holy book.

In April last year, Paludan’s announcement of a Quran burning “tour” during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan sparked riots across Sweden.

Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billström told TT news agency on Friday that Sweden respects the freedom of speech.

Turkey has so far refused to approve their bids, which need sign-off by all member states, and tied its favourable vote to Swedish steps to extradite people it accuses of terrorism or of having played a part in the 2016 coup attempt against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Sweden’s ambassador to Turkey was summoned last week after a video posted by a Kurdish group in Stockholm that depicted Erdogan swinging by his legs from a rope.

A tweet by the group, Rojava Committee of Sweden, compared Erdogan with Italy’s Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini, who was hung upside down after his execution in the closing days of World War II.