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ENVIRONMENT

Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg to face trial again

Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg will face court again at the end of September, charged with 'resisting arrest' at a protest.

Published: 15 September 2023 13:25 CEST
Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg to face trial again
Greta Thunberg at a previous trial at Malmö District Court. Photo: Andreas Hillergren/TT

Police forcibly removed the 20-year-old campaigner from a climate rally in the Swedish port city on July 24th.

“The protest was unauthorised and led to traffic being blocked. The young woman refused to obey police order to leave the site,” said prosecutor Isabel Ekberg.

“This is therefore a case of refusal to comply.”

Hours before the July rally, Thunberg received a court fine after a short trial and conviction for disobeying police at a previous protest at the same port on June 19th.

The rally, organised by environmental activist group Reclaim the Future, tried to block the entrance and exit to the busy port to protest against the use of fossil fuels.

The date for Thunberg’s new trial has been set for September 27th.

The activist shot to global fame after starting her “School Strike for the Climate” in front of Sweden’s parliament in Stockholm at the age of 15.

In addition to her climate strikes, the young activist regularly lambasts governments and politicians for not properly addressing climate issues.

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CRIME

Swedish police chief: ‘Kids are contacting gangs to become killers’

More and more children are contacting criminal gangs in Sweden to offer their services as contract killers, the country's police chief said on Friday, after three people were murdered in 24 hours.

Published: 29 September 2023 15:18 CEST
Swedish police chief: 'Kids are contacting gangs to become killers'

Sweden has in recent years been in the grip of a bloody conflict between gangs fighting over arms and drug trafficking. That has escalated with internal fighting within a leading gang.

Apartment buildings and homes across the country are frequently rocked by explosions. Shootings, once limited to disadvantaged areas, have become regular occurrences in public places in the usually tranquil, wealthy country.

“We have a situation where children are contacting criminal gangs to become killers,” police chief Anders Thornberg told journalists.

“The criminals are ruthless,” Thornberg said, adding that the gangs also contacted people, often minors, and “furnished them with weapons and gave them the address in which to stage the attack”. 

Even the victims were often young.

This month, 12 people were killed in shootings and explosions, the deadliest month in the past four years in Sweden.

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Senior police official Mats Lindström said he had seen many messages from young people contacting gangs for contract killings.

In August 2023, there were 69 people aged under 18 in custody in Sweden, against 14 in the same month two years earlier.

On Thursday evening, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson vowed to defeat criminal gangs with the help of the military.

“We are going to hunt down the gangs. We are going to defeat the gangs,” Kristersson said in a televised address to the nation.

“An increasing number of children and completely innocent people are affected by this extreme violence,” Kristersson said.

“Sweden has never seen anything like this. No other country in Europe is seeing anything like this.”

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