Swedish court today found a man guilty of trying to finance the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been waging an armed struggle against the Turkish state since 1984.

The verdict comes at a sensitive time for Sweden’s relations with Turkey. Ankara is delaying Sweden’s bid to join NATO, in part because it claims Sweden harbors supporters of paramilitary groups Ankara considers terrorist.

Counsel of the defendant did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

US President Joe Biden on Wednesday expressed his support for Sweden’s NATO membership in talks with Prime Minister Ulf Kristerson, while doubts remain that Turkey will lift its objections in time for the alliance’s summit next week. .

“The district court finds guilty Kurdish from Turkey for trying to pressure Kurdo businessman in Stockholm to pay money to the PKK at gunpoint,” judge Mans Viggen said in a statement.

“The blackmail attempt was made within the context of the PKK’s extensive fundraising activity in Europe, that is through blackmail,” he said.

The court convicted the man in prison for four years and six months for attempted extortion, a serious weapons offense and terrorist financing, according to the verdict.

“The man must also be deported from Sweden and banned from returning here, without a time limit,” the court said in its ruling.