Finland says a 'time-out' is needed in talks with Turkey over Nordic NATO membership - CNBC
I think there will be a break for a couple of weeks," Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto told Reuters in an interview published Tuesday.
The burning of the Quran, Islam's holy book, was led by Rasmus Paludan, who leads the Danish far-right political party Hard Line.Swedish authorities say the protest was legal under the country's free speech laws, but Sweden's leaders condemned the act, calling it "appalling."A banner on the window of Swedish Consulate General, saying: "We do not share that bookburning idiot's view" as supporters of Free Cause Party (Huda Par) and Quranic Generation Platform (Kuran Nesli Platformu) stage a protest against the burning of the Quran outside consulate general in Istanbul on Sunday, Turkey on January 22, 2023.Finland and Sweden have since May 2022 made clear their intention to join the NATO alliance simultaneously, decidedly dropping their long-held policy of non-alignment following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.But the latest scheduled meetings were canceled after the Quran burning incident, as well as a protest by Kurdish activists in Sweden several days earlier that featured an effigy of Erdogan hanging upside down by a rope.