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When asked about the burning of the Koran, the Swedish Minister of Foreign Affairs was silent. Photo/Politico
BRUSSELS – Minister of Foreign Affairs Sweden refrain from answering questions about the burning of Muslim holy books, al-Quran recently outside the Embassy Turki di Stockholm.
Sweden’s foreign minister, Tobias Billstrom, attended a session of the European Parliament’s Committee on Foreign Relations in Brussels to talk about the priorities of the Swedish president’s term of office. It was just days after an extremist politician burned copies of the Koran with police protection and permission from the Swedish government.
Marton Gyongyosi, a Hungarian independent MP, asked how Sweden would speed up its NATO membership process amid the latest protests in Stockholm targeting Turkey and its president, as well as the burning of Korans.
Rasmus Paludan, a Swedish-Danish extremist politician, was behind the burning of the Koran in the Swedish capital on Saturday.
This was followed a day later by Edwin Wagensveld, a right-wing Dutch politician and leader of the Islamophobic group Pegida, ripping pages from a copy of the Koran in The Hague. Wagensveld’s Twitter videos show him burning torn bible pages in a pot.
Read: Facts about Rasmus Paludan, the Swedish origin of the Koran burner
Gyongyosi noted that this incident had a negative impact on the stance of Ankara, a NATO ally for more than seven decades that Sweden and Finland need to ratify their membership applications to join the alliance.
Regarding the question of burning the Koran, Billstrom chose not to answer it.
After the session, the Swedish foreign minister answered the Swedish journalist’s questions but ignored questions from Anadolu, despite having heard them.
He told Swedish journalists that Stockholm contacted Helsinki to better understand Turkey’s latest statement on the matter.
