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Sweden’s opposition calls for emergency meeting on Quran burnings

Sweden's Social Democrat opposition has demanded the government call an emergency parliamentary meeting over the ongoing Quran-burning protests.

Published: 25 July 2023 14:13 CEST
Sweden's opposition calls for emergency meeting on Quran burnings
The Social Democrats' foreign policy spokesperson said it was normal for MPs to be recalled in times of crisis. Photo: Oscar Olsson/TT

“We are calling for the foreign policy committee to be called to an extra meeting as soon as possible as a result of what is now happening,” the Social Democrats’ foreign policy spokesperson Morgan Johansson said in a statement. “We fully expect that the government will take whatever measures are necessary to protect Swedish lives and the Swedish interests.” 

Johansson said it was important that the government lay out for the other parties how it intended to deal with the ongoing disruption caused by the the Quran burnings, both domestically and internationally.  

“We find ourselves in an extremely serious situation which has been getting steadily worse,” he said 

Sweden’s embassy in Baghdad was stormed and burned last Thursday over plans by the Sweden-based Iraqi refugee Salwan Momika to burn a copy of the Quran. 

Algeria on Monday became the latest country to summon the top Swedish diplomat in the country, saying that it “firmly condemns these immoral and uncivil acts that target all that is sacred for Muslims the world over.” 

On Monday, a 31-year-old man lodged a request to burn the holy book of Islam in front of the Iranian embassy in a protest against the country’s Islamic regime, an act which is likely to trigger another wave of outrage. 

The Social Democrats’ demand puts the three party coalition government in a difficult situation, because parliament has been in recess since the start of July and is not due to reopen until August 22nd, meaning most MPs are currently in far-flung summer houses .

Johansson said that it was normal for MPs to be temporarily called back from their summer breaks if there is serious business to be dealt with. 

“This is how things are usually handled in times of crisis,” he said. 

“The government,” he added, “has a duty to account for what they are doing and I can only say that the government has been very quiet so far during this crisis and said practically nothing. I have a certain understanding for this, but at the same time, you have a duty to show bit of leadership and answer some of the public’s questions.” 

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INSIDE SWEDEN

Inside Sweden: Why troll factory won’t spark a government crisis

The Local's editor Emma Löfgren rounds up the biggest stories of the week in our Inside Sweden newsletter.

Published: 18 May 2024 09:22 CEST
Inside Sweden: Why troll factory won't spark a government crisis

Hej,

News that the Sweden Democrats are operating a far-right troll factory – which among other things the party uses to smear political opponents as well as its supposed allies – has caused probably the biggest rift yet between them and the three other parties that make up Sweden’s ruling coalition.

The leaders of the Moderates, Christian Democrats and Liberals all strongly criticised the Sweden Democrats’ blatant violation of the so-called “respect clause” in their Tidö collaboration agreement – the clause that states that the four parties should speak respectfully of each other in the media.

But after crisis talks held on Thursday, the conflict appears to be dying down.

The Sweden Democrats hit out strongly at the TV4 Kalla Fakta documentary where the troll factory was revealed, calling it a smear campaign and disinformation, but simultaneously went as far as to confirm that they do run anonymous social media accounts for which they refused to apologise.

They did say sorry to the Tidö parties for including them in the smear campaigns, and promised to remove some of the posts that had offended the other three parties, plus reassign a couple of members of staff to other duties until they’ve been given training on the Tidö “respect clause”.

But that doesn’t remove the fact that they vowed to continue the anonymous social media accounts whose existence they had prior to the documentary consistently denied, or the fact that some of the social media posts shared not only vague anti-immigration content, but white power propaganda.

The Liberals took the row the furthest, with Liberal leader Johan Pehrson describing people in his party as skitförbannade – pissed off as hell. He said ahead of the crisis meeting that they would demand that the Sweden Democrats cease all anonymous posting, which the latter rejected.

The party had two choices: walk out of the government collaboration and possibly spark a snap election, or walk back its strong words ahead of the meeting and wait for it to blow over.

They chose a kind of middle way, and called for an inquiry to be launched into banning political parties from operating anonymous social media accounts. The Social Democrats immediately accused the Liberals of trying to “bury the issue in an inquiry” – a classic Swedish political method of indecisive conflict avoidance which the Social Democrats themselves are well familiar with.

The Christian Democrats and Moderates both said that the Sweden Democrats had accepted their criticism and welcomed the party’s reshuffling of staff within its communications department, adding that it still had to prove its commitment to the Tidö agreement going forward.

So why isn’t this causing a bigger government crisis?

We asked Evelyn Jones, a politics reporter for the Dagens Nyheter daily, to come on the Sweden in Focus podcast to explain it to us:

“The Sweden Democrats are the biggest party in this coalition, even though they’re not part of the government. So the government really needs them. It’s hard for them to just stop cooperating with the Sweden Democrats,” she said.

“The cooperation between the government parties and the Sweden Democrats has been going pretty smoothly since the last election – more smoothly than a lot of people thought. This is probably the biggest crisis so far, but how big it is, is hard to say.”

You can listen to the full interview with her and the rest of the Sweden in Focus podcast here. 

In other news

If you are a descendant of a Sweden-born person and would like to find out more about them, there are ways to do that. I wrote this week about how to research your Swedish ancestry.

That guide was prompted by my interview with the chair of a community history group in a small parish in north-central Sweden, which has tried to get to the bottom of rumours that US mega star Taylor Swift’s ancestors hail from their village. I had so much fun writing this article.

The EU elections will be held on June 9th, but advance voting begins next week in Sweden. And poll cards are already being sent out, so if you’re eligible to vote you should receive yours soon.

Sweden’s consumer price index fell to 3.9 percent in April, below 4.0 percent for the first time in two years, reinforcing predictions that the central bank will keep lowering interest rates.

Sweden’s four-party government bloc has broken with the other parties in a parliamentary committee on public service broadcasting, adding what the opposition complains are “radically changed” proposals. How shocking are they?

Many people move to Sweden because of their partner’s career. Perhaps you’re one of these so-called “trailing spouses”. I’ve been asking readers in this situation how they’re settling in, and will have an article for you next week. There’s still time to answer our survey to share your experience.

Thanks for reading.

Have a good weekend,

Emma

Inside Sweden is our weekly newsletter for members which gives you news, analysis and, sometimes, takes you behind the scenes at The Local. It’s published each Saturday and with Membership+ you can also receive it directly to your inbox.

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