Foreign power could be linked to anti-Islam campaigner's murder: Swedish PM

STOCKHOLM: Sweden's prime minister on Thursday said a foreign power may have been involved in the murder of an Iraqi refugee who stoked international tensions by burning Holy Qurans at protests in 2023.

The murder incident took place hours before a trial verdict was going to be announced on Thursday over his burning the religious book.

38-year-old Salwan Momika was shot in a house on Wednesday in Sodertalje town near Stockholm. Without stating if the shooter was one of them, police said a prosecutor directed them to detain five persons.

"I can guarantee that the security services are deeply involved in this because there is obviously a risk that there is also a link to foreign power," Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told a press conference a day after 38-year-old Salwan Momika, a Christian from Iraq, was shot dead south of Stockholm.

Vice Prime Minister Ebba Busch condemned the murder.

"It is a threat to our free democracy. It must be met with the full force of our society," she wrote on X.

A Stockholm court dismissed the case on Momika after his death. It said the verdict for another man in the same criminal trial over "offences of agitation against an ethnic or national group," in connection with Holy Quran burnings would be postponed until Monday.

Sweden in 2023 raised its terrorism alert to the second-highest level and warned of threats against Swedes at home and abroad after the Holy Quran burnings, most of them by Momika, outraged Muslims.

Sweden's Security Service told Reuters it was assessing the potential impact of the shooting "on Swedish security."

While the Swedish government condemned the wave of Holy Quran burnings in 2023, it is widely regarded as a protected form of free speech.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in 2023 that people who desecrate the Holy Quran should face the "most severe punishment" and Sweden had "gone into battle-array for war on the Muslim world" by supporting those responsible.

Sweden's migration agency in 2023 wanted to deport Momika for giving false information on his residency application, but couldn't as he risked torture and inhumane treatment in Iraq.