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☆ Sweden and Iran exchange prisoners in breakthrough deal, officials say
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-15 | by ( Story Reuters | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

Stockholm Reuters —Sweden and Iran carried out a prisoner exchange on Saturday, officials said, with Sweden freeing a former Iranian official convicted for his role in a mass execution in the 1980s while Iran released two Swedes being held there. “Iran used them both as pawns in a cynical negotiations game with the purpose of getting the Iranian citizen Hamid Noury released from prison in Sweden. Noury was freed in a prisoner swap with Iran, Sweden said on Saturday. Swedish-Iranian dual national Saeed Azizi was arrested in Iran in November 2023 on what Sweden called “wrongful grounds.”Another Swedish-Iranian dual national, Ahmadreza Djalali, arrested in 2016, remains in an Iranian jail. An emergency medicine doctor, Djalali was arrested in 2016 while on an academic visit to Iran.

Persons: Hamid Noury, Noury, Ulf Kristersson, Johan Floderus, Saeed Azizi, ” Kristersson, Kristersson, Anders Humlebo, Ahmadreza Djalali, Djalali Organizations: Stockholm Reuters —, Swedish, TT, Agency, AFP, Getty, National Council of Resistance, Islamic, European Union Locations: Stockholm, Stockholm Reuters — Sweden, Iran, Sweden, Oman, Tehran, ”, “ Iran, Karaj, Islamic Republic, Floderus, Israel, Iranian, Swedish

☆ Sweden Closes Investigation Into Nord Stream Pipeline Blasts
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-07 | by ( Rebecca R. Ruiz | More About Rebecca R. Ruiz | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The Swedish authorities on Wednesday closed a more than yearlong investigation into the undersea attack on the Nord Stream pipelines, citing a lack of authority to further pursue those responsible for sabotaging the critical piece of energy infrastructure intended to supply Western Europe with Russian gas. “Sweden does not have the jurisdiction to investigate this matter further,” the Swedish Security Service said in a statement on Wednesday. The series of underwater explosions ripped holes in three of the four strands of Nord Stream pipelines and led officials to conclude that they were most likely caused by a state actor. Some saw the attacks, which came close to damaging a cable supplying electricity from Sweden to Poland, as a warning that raised concern about what other infrastructure could be vulnerable. The blasts occurred in international waters but in the economic zones of Sweden and Denmark, which gave those nations a hook to investigate.

Persons: Ukraine — Organizations: Swedish Security Service Locations: Europe, Sweden, Ukraine, Russia, Poland, Denmark

Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom said staff at the Swedish embassy in Baghdad were safe but Iraqi authorities had failed in their responsibility to protect the embassy. Thursday's demonstration was called by supporters of Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to protest at the second planned Koran burning in Sweden in weeks, according to posts in a Telegram group linked to the influential cleric and other pro-Sadr media. He stood by the embassy storming on Thursday, telling a press conference the U.S. "has no right to condemn the burning of the Swedish embassy but should have condemned the burning of the Koran". "Yes, yes to the Koran," protesters chanted. Sweden has seen several Koran burnings in recent years, mostly by far-right and anti-Muslim activists.

Persons: Tobias Billstrom, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, Mohammed Shia Al, Billstrom, Muqtada al, Moqtada al, Read, Tayyip Erdogan, Ulf Kristersson, Timour Azhari, Anna Ringstrom, Supantha Mukherjee, Johan Ahlander, Marie, Louise Breusch Rasmussen, Ahmed Rasheed, Tom Hogue, Tom Perry, Lincoln, Bernadette Baum, William Maclean, Alison Williams, Cynthia Osterman Organizations: NATO, Sweden's Ericsson, State Department, Telegram, Turkish, Sweden's, Islam, Marie Mannes, Thomson Locations: Iraq, BAGHDAD, STOCKHOLM, Swedish, Stockholm, Baghdad, Iraqi, Sweden, Tehran, Turkey, Washington, Sadr, Copenhagen

☆ Sweden is considering making Koran burnings illegal, Aftonbladet reports
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-06 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

STOCKHOLM, July 6 (Reuters) - The Swedish government is examining whether it could make setting the Koran or other holy books on fire illegal, as recent Koran burnings have damaged Sweden's security, Justice Minister Gunnar Strommer told Aftonbladet paper on Thursday. An Iraqi immigrant to Sweden burned the Koran outside a Stockholm mosque last week, causing outrage in the Muslim world and condemnation from the Pope. The Swedish Security services said such action left the country less safe. "We have to ask ourselves whether the current order is good or whether there is reason to reconsider it," Strommer told Aftonbladet. "We can see that the Koran burning last week has generated threats to our internal security," he said.

Persons: Gunnar Strommer, Pope, Strommer, Tayyip Erdogan, Johan Ahlander, Alexandra Hudson Organizations: NATO, Alexandra Hudson Our, Thomson Locations: STOCKHOLM, Swedish, Iraqi, Sweden, Stockholm

☆ Sweden increasingly a focus for Islamic extremists, security police say
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/2] Houthi supporters rally to denounce the burning of a copy of the holy Koran during Sweden protests, in Sanaa, Yemen January 23, 2023. "Recent developments with threats targeted at Sweden and Swedish interests are serious and affect Sweden's security," the Swedish Security Service SAPO said in a statement. "The developments mean that Sweden is deemed to be in greater focus than previously for violent Islamic extremists globally." SAPO said it had not raised its formal assessment of the threat level against the country, which is at 3 on a scale up to 5, equivalent to "elevated". "The terror-threat level is based on a long-term assessment which means that if the developments continue for a time, the threat level could be raised," SAPO said.

☆ Traces of explosives found at Nord Stream pipelines, confirming 'gross sabotage,' Sweden says
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-18 | by ( Leila Sackur | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

Investigators found traces of explosives at the site of the damaged Nord Stream pipeline in the Baltic sea, confirming that the pipelines had been subject to “gross sabotage,” the Swedish Security Service said Friday. The statement did not expand on how the explosives might have got there and said an investigation was ongoing. The Swedish statement confirmed preliminary findings by Swedish and Danish authorities in October that “powerful explosions” had caused damage to the Nord Stream pipelines, referring to ruptures in the pipeline in Denmark’s exclusive economic zone. Underwater blasts ruptured the Nord Stream pipelines, which carry natural gases from Russia to Germany under the Baltic sea, in late September. Russia and Norway are the two major European exporters of natural gas, upon whom the rest of Europe has long been dependent.

☆ Sweden shuns formal joint investigation of Nord Stream leak, citing national security
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-14 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

Mats Ljungqvist, the prosecutor involved in Sweden's criminal investigation into the Nord Stream leaks in the Swedish economic zone, said Sweden was already co-operating with Denmark and Germany on the matter. He said Sweden had rejected the proposal for a Joint Investigation Team (JIT) from judicial co-operation agency Eurojust because a such a joint investigation would include legal agreements under which Sweden would have to share information from its own investigation that it deemed confidential. He made his comment after a report in German weekly Der Spiegel on Friday that Sweden had rejected plans for a joint investigation with Denmark and Germany, citing German security sources. A Swedish Security Services spokesperson said the security police were co-operating closely with other authorities, also internationally, as part of the Swedish criminal investigation. German TV programme Tagesschau on German public broadcaster ARD said that Denmark, too, had turned down setting up a joint investigation team.

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