Turkey jails outlawed PKK member

ISTANBUL: A Turkish court on Saturday jailed a convicted member of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers´ Party (PKK) a day after Sweden extradited him, state media reported.

After Russia invaded Ukraine, Finland and Sweden in May dropped decades of military non-alignment and sought to join Nato. That requires a consensus within the US-led defence alliance, but Turkey and Hungary have so far not ratified their membership. Turkey has demanded the Nordic countries take a tougher stance on Kurdish groups it deems “terrorists” in exchange for its backing. Mahmut Tat was sentenced to more than six years in jail over being a member of the PKK in Turkey. He fled to Sweden in 2015, but Stockholm rejected his asylum request.

Tat arrived in Istanbul on Friday night after Sweden detained and extradited him, the Anadolu news agency reported.