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Sweden Torah burning protester abandons his plan

A 32-year-old man, who sparked condemnation from Israel for his plans to burn a Torah in Stockholm, on Saturday said he was not going to go ahead with his protest.

Published: 16 July 2023 09:20 CEST
Stockholm
Ahmad A., the organiser of the demonstration, explained that his aim actually was not to burn the holy books but to criticise the people who have burned Korans in Sweden in recent months. Photo by Fredrik Öhlander on Unsplash

He explained that his intention was in fact to denounce those who burn sacred books such as the Quran in the Nordic country.

Swedish police on Friday said they had granted a permit for a protest which was to include a burning of the Torah and the Bible outside the Israeli embassy in Stockholm.

Israel’s President Isaac Herzog was one of several Israeli representatives and Jewish organisations to immediately condemn the decision.

Ahmad A., the organiser of the demonstration, explained that his aim actually was not to burn the holy books but to criticise the people who have burned Qurans in Sweden in recent months, something that Swedish law does not prohibit.

“This is a response to the people who burn the Quran. I want to show that freedom of expression has limits that must be taken into account,” explained the Swedish resident of Syrian origin.

“I want to show that we have to respect each other, we live in the same society. If I burn the Torah, another the Bible, another the Quran, there will be war here. What I wanted to show is that it’s not right to do it,” he added.

In January, Swedish-Danish right-wing extremist Rasmus Paludan burned a Quran to denounce Sweden’s membership application to Nato and the negotiations with Turkey to allow Sweden to join the alliance.

On June 28th, an Iraqi refugee in Sweden burned some pages of a copy of the Quran in front of Stockholm’s largest mosque during Eid al-Adha, a festival celebrated by Muslims around the world.

The two events triggered a series of condemnations in the Muslim world.

Although the Swedish police pointed out that permission to demonstrate was not a formal authorisation to burn a sacred book, there is no law prohibiting the burning of holy books.

But the police can refuse to allow a demonstration if it jeopardises the security or gives rise to acts or words that incite racial hatred.

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POLITICS

Swedish PM won’t end Sweden Democrats collaboration over ‘troll factory’

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has no plans to break off the government's collaboration with the Sweden Democrats, he told a press conference, after an undercover investigation revealed that the party had been running a so-called "troll factory".

Published: 22 May 2024 17:24 CEST
Swedish PM won't end Sweden Democrats collaboration over 'troll factory'

During a press conference following a party leader debate in parliament, Kristersson, from the Moderates, was asked whether he, as prime minister, would put any pressure on the Sweden Democrats to stop using the anonymous accounts, which had been used to spread content of benefit to the party and degrade its political opponents.

He replied saying that he cannot make demands or take responsibility for the actions of the Sweden Democrats’ communications department.

“If your real question is: ‘Do you want to stop working together to solve Sweden’s major problems because I have strong objections to smear campaigns in Swedish politics’, then the answer is no,” he said.

He did, however, say that he had discussed the issue with Åkesson both in public and in private.

“[I’ve told him] that I dislike smear campaigns, that they need to answer legitimate questions put to them by the media, political opponents and coalition partners. And that I dislike anonymous accounts.”

He added that the Sweden Democrats should “moderate their tone”.

The Sweden Democrats had not only been using the accounts to smear opposition parties, but also the governing coalition of the Liberals, Moderates and Christian Democrats, which the party provides its support to under the Tidö Agreement, named after the castle where it was drawn up.

The Tidö Agreement includes a clause requiring all four parties to “speak respectfully” about each other.

In one clip from the Kalla Fakta documentary revealing the existence of the troll factory, Sweden Democrat communications head Joakim Wallerstein tells the group of troll factory workers to “find shit” on the Christian Democrats’ top candidate for the EU parliament, Alice Teodorescu Måwe, while others make fun of Liberal leader Johan Pehrson.

In another, one of the employees in the troll factory discusses what type of music to use when he should “shit on” the Moderates.

Anti-racism magazine Expo also reported that the Sweden Democrats had used their anonymous accounts to share white power material.

Since Kalla Fakta’s documentary was released, Sweden Democrat leader Jimmie Åkesson has responded by claiming that Swedish media are carrying out their own campaign against his party, calling the documentary part of a “domestic smear campaign from the left-liberal establishment”.

LISTEN: Uncovering a Sweden Democrat troll factory

Kristersson did not wish to comment on Åkesson’s response, but he disagreed that Swedish media and political parties are carrying out a smear or influence campaign.

“I definitely perceive influence operations from other countries, and we often feed back to you [the media] and tell you what we know about those things. I obviously do not perceive any influence operations from parties, media or anyone else in Sweden.”

As far as Åkesson’s claims that Kalla Fakta had “infiltrated” the Sweden Democrats, Kristersson said that it would be “completely foreign to me to interfere with how free media operate in a free democracy”.

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