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SWEDEN

Auschwitz theft suspect claims persecution

Swedish former neo-Nazi leader Anders Högström, held in Poland in connection with the theft of the "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign from Auschwitz, has reported the tax agency (Skatteverket) for denying him protected identity, arguing that he is being victimized.

Auschwitz theft suspect claims persecution

In a letter to the parliamentary ombudsman (Justitieombudsmännen – JO), Högström has claimed that he and his family have been subjected to threats and violence, arguing that he is unable to return to Sweden until “this issue is resolved.”

“[I] request that the Ombudsman investigate the circumstances surrounding why I was denied a classified national registration status,” wrote Högström. “I am suspected for the sign theft in Poland and my home and my relatives have been damaged and threatened.”

34-year-old Högström argued that he had previously submitted six medical certificates along with police documentation of 62 death threats and threatened assaults as well as other public documents supporting his application.

The former neo-Nazi furthermore alleges that the tax agency’s choice of administrator may have had some bearing on his case.

“An anti-apartheid activist who immigrated from Gambia, a man of great reputation? Eight children with different women..many born the same year every few months….,” Högström wrote asking why the original administrator was taken off his case.

He alleged that his new administrator rejected the request for a classification status on the grounds that “a public figure only has himself to blame.”

Högström also forwards claims that he had been attacked with a needle and has suffered personality changes as result, a development that he claims would never happened had he been anonymous in the register.

“Many say that my personality has changed due to what was injected into me… I received blisters, sweating, nausea, vomiting, everything is documented in the case record that was shown to the tax agency.”

Anders Högström is currently been held in custody in Poland after he was extradited from Sweden in April, two months after his arrest on a Polish warrant. A court in the southern Polish city of Krakow, where he is being questioned, ordered him to stay behind bars for at least two more months in April, Poland’s PAP news agency reported.

Högström has denied plotting the December 18th theft of the gateway sign from the site of the camp in the southern Polish city of Oswiecim, which became a notorious symbol of genocide by the occupying Nazi Germans.

Polish police recovered the five-metre metal “Arbeit Macht Frei” sign (“Work Will Set You Free” in German) on December 20th.

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NORWAY

Norway to send 200,000 AstraZeneca doses to Sweden and Iceland

Norway, which has suspended the use of AstraZeneca's Covid vaccine until further notice, will send 216,000 doses to Sweden and Iceland at their request, the Norwegian health ministry said Thursday.

Norway to send 200,000 AstraZeneca doses to Sweden and Iceland
Empty vials of the AstraZeneca vaccine. (Photo by GABRIEL BOUYS / AFP)

“I’m happy that the vaccines we have in stock can be put to use even if the AstraZeneca vaccine has been paused in Norway,” Health Minister Bent Høie said in a statement.

The 216,000 doses, which are currently stored in Norwegian fridges, have to be used before their expiry dates in June and July.

Sweden will receive 200,000 shots and Iceland 16,000 under the expectation they will return the favour at some point. 

“If we do resume the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, we will get the doses back as soon as we ask,” Høie said.

Like neighbouring Denmark, Norway suspended the use of the AstraZeneca jab on March 11 in order to examine rare but potentially severe side effects, including blood clots.

Among the 134,000 AstraZeneca shots administered in Norway before the suspension, five cases of severe thrombosis, including three fatal ones, had been registered among relatively young people in otherwise good health. One other person died of a brain haemorrhage.

On April 15, Norway’s government ignored a recommendation from the Institute of Public Health to drop the AstraZeneca jab for good, saying it wanted more time to decide.

READ MORE: Norway delays final decision on withdrawal of AstraZeneca vaccine 

The government has therefore set up a committee of Norwegian and international experts tasked with studying all of the risks linked to the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, which is also suspected of causing blood clots.

Both are both based on adenovirus vector technology. Denmark is the only European country to have dropped the AstraZeneca
vaccine from its vaccination campaign, and said on Tuesday it would “lend” 55,000 doses to the neighbouring German state of Schleswig-Holstein.

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