1. Mehmet Guner Kaplan was born on 18 July 1971 and is a Swedish politician of Turkish origin who served as Minister for Housing and Urban Development from 2014 to 2016.
11 Facts About Mehmet Kaplan
1. 2.
Mehmet Kaplan is a member of the Swedish Green Party.
3.
Mehmet Kaplan came under increasing pressure after local media published photos of him at a dinner with Turkish ultranationalists, including the Swedish head of the extremist Grey Wolves organisation, and a former leader of the main Turkish nationalist group in Sweden, who called on Turks to kill Armenians.
4.
Mehmet Kaplan was born to Turkish family in Gaziantep, Turkey; he migrated to Sweden at age 8.
5.
Mehmet Kaplan was a member of the Riksdag and before that spokesperson for the Muslim Council of Sweden and Young Muslims of Sweden.
6.
Mehmet Kaplan was a founding member of the organization Swedish Muslims for Peace and Justice, a Muslim peace movement, as well as a strong supporter of the Swedish peace movement.
7.
Mehmet Kaplan was a member of the board of the Green Party between 2003 and 2011.
8.
Mehmet Kaplan was on board the Ship to Gaza flotilla which tried to protest against the Israeli embargo of the Gaza strip.
9.
On 1 July 2014, in a Fight Racism Now seminar held in Visby, Mehmet Kaplan compared the young Muslims from Sweden who went to fight for any force in the Syrian civil war with those Swedes who volunteered to fight for Finland against Russia in the Winter War during the Second World War.
10.
Mehmet Kaplan commented that his statements had been misrepresented, but admitted to having chosen his words poorly.
11.
Mehmet Kaplan has been labeled being an Islamist by various personalities, including the previous MP, Nalin Pekgul of the Swedish Social Democratic Party.