SWEDEN AND TURKEY
Turkey on Wednesday summoned the Swedish ambassador after an “insulting” television programme, the Turkish state news
agency reported, as the two countries’ relations remain tense over Stockholm’s bid to join Nato.
Published: 5 October 2022 19:25 CEST
The Kurdish comic Kadir Meral was given a section on the Svenska Nyheter satire programme. Photo: Screenshot/SVT
“The Turkish foreign ministry summoned today the Swedish ambassador to Ankara, Staffan Herrstrom, because of a broadcast on Swedish television (SVT) that contained insulting statements and images against Turkey and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan,” news agency Anadolu said.
In the dressing down, Herrstrom was told that the “impertinent and ugly expression and images” about Erdogan and Turkey were unacceptable.
On Friday, Kristoffer Ahonen Appelquist, the host of the satire show Svenska Nyheter, called on the Swedish-Kurdish comic Kadir Meral who for several minutes ridiculed Erdogan in Kurdish, finishing with an off-colour homophobic slur.
At the same time Ahonen Appelquist, called Erdogan fool, Swedish for “a fool”.
The title of the episode, The Veto Turkor “the veto Turk”, is already offensive, as it use the “X-turken” format often used for racist Swedish meme videos.
In the episode, Ahonen Appelquist at first ridicules Erdogan for his campaign theme song, then covers a woman who was imprisoned for calling Erdogan “grumpy” on Twitter, and talks of Turkeys 38,000 political prisoners, and its lack of a free press.
It then covers the agreement struck at the Nato Madrid summit, and why allowing Swedish weapons exports to Turkey might mean they are used to wage war on Kurds in northern Syria, and how Erdogan is demanding Sweden send back ordinary Kurdish journalists who he sees as “terrorists”.
“It’s just ridiculous,” Ahonen Appelquist says. “He doesn’t even like them [the Kurds]and we do! And we use the Kurds for things, like culture and politics and Sommarprat [the Summer broadcasts from celebrities on Swedish radio] and stuff.”
He then brings on Meral, whose skit bubbles from Nordstream are Erdogan farting, then ridicules him for being balding and then for his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Finally, he says, “Erdogan, you think you are a Sultan, but really you are like a Sultan bed from Ikea, which stands on all fours in the bedroom.”
Then there’s a picture of Erdogan bent over.
“But you know what, in Sweden, we think that that kind of thing is totally OK,” Meral says.
You can see the episode (in Swedish) here.