Kurds pay tribute to former Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme

Former Swedish Prime Minister and former leader of the Social Democratic Labor Party, Olof Palme, was commemorated on the 35th anniversary of his death at the place where he was shot as well as at his grave.

Flowers were left on Sunday where Palme was shot. Party members, carrying the flags of Sweden and the Social Democratic Labor Party in their hands organised a vigil at the leader’s grave.

A crowded Kurdish delegation also visited Palme’s grave and held a memorial. Wreaths prepared by the Kurdistan National Congress (KNK) and the Swedish Democratic Kurdish Community Center were put on Palme's grave.

Speakers for the KNK and the Swedish Democratic Kurdish Community Center, pointed out that Palme was a close friend of the Kurdish people and was murdered for his attitude towards reactionary and imperialist states.

KNK co-chair Ahmet Karamuş said that Palme was shot and killed on a cold February night. Reminding that Kurds in Sweden and all over the world were deeply saddened by the murder of Palme, Karamus added that the Kurds have lost a friend who fought for democracy, justice and freedom.

Karamus added that “Olof Palme was a politician who sided with Kurds in the search of a solution to the Kurdish issue and reminded that a dirty propaganda game indicated Kurds as being behind the killing, something widely proved a lie and a dirty game by the Turkish state.

Nadia Saleh, co-chair of the Swedish Democratic Kurdish Community Center, pointed out that immediately after Palme's murder, the Swedish police wanted to put the responsibility of the murder on the Kurds, despite the lack of evidence.

Saleh also underlined the situation of Kurdish people's leader Abdullah Ocalan who has been abducted in Kenya in 1999 by the CIA and the Mossad and has been in Imrali maximum security prison island for 22 years under a regime of isolation.

Saleh said she was confident that if Palme had lived, he would have sided with the Kurdish Freedom Struggle. She demanded that the PKK be taken off the list of terrorist organizations.