Norway’s right-wing Progress Party quit the country’s ruling coalition on Monday over the government’s decision to repatriate a woman accused of links to the Islamic State terror group.
The move will not trigger fresh elections, which the Norwegian constitution does not allow. Prime Minister Erna Solberg said that she plans to stay in office as head of a minority government comprised of the coalition’s remaining three parties.
“I brought us into government, and I’m now bringing the party out,” Finance Minister Siv Jensen, leader of the Progress Party, said at a press conference, explaining that the decision to bring back a woman accused of supporting terrorists had made it too difficult to stay on as coalition partner.
The woman at the center of the row returned to Norway on Saturday with her two children so that her five-year-old son, who was said to be seriously ill, could receive medical treatment. She was arrested at Oslo airport on suspicion of being a member of the Islamic State but denies the allegations.
She had left Norway for Syria in 2013 and reportedly married twice while living under the Islamic State, also giving birth to her two children there. Until this weekend, she and her children had lived in the al-Hol displacement camp under Kurdish control.
The Progress Party, which is strongly opposed to assisting Norwegians who married foreign fighters or joined terrorist groups, has argued that the woman’s son could be treated without letting his mother come back into the country.