Report: Swedish Police Lacked Competence During Easter Qur’an Riots

The Associated Press
The Associated Press
Chris Tomlinson

A report into the Easter riots earlier this year sparked by anti-Islam activists has determined that Swedish police lacked both the proper skills and the manpower to deal with the violence.

An external investigation into the riots by adherents of the Islamic faith, which took place over several days at Easter and which saw several cities rocked by violence after burnings of the Islamic Qur’an by the anti-Islam group Stram Kurs led by Danish activist Rasmus Paludan, has concluded.

Swedish police external investigator Gunnar Karlsson criticised the response of the police, saying, “There are things that can and should be done in a different way,” broadcaster SVT reports.

“In most cases, the equipment has been appropriate, but in several cases, police officers were deployed without training against this threat,” Karlsson said and added that police leadership had learned little from past riots.

Johan Olsson, a manager at the Swedish Police Authority (Noa), stated that police have already started to address issues going forward saying, “We have to constantly reassess our priorities. What happened at Easter must not be repeated. We have several hundred injured colleagues.”

Olsson added that more police across the country would be trained in special police tactics but did not specify what number of officers would undergo the training.

In the aftermath of the riots, many police were not only physically injured but also reported mental issues suffered after the violence. In the city of Örebro alone, around half of the police who were deployed during the riots claimed to have experienced mental health problems, such as difficulties sleeping and eating along with heightened anxiety.

Over the course of the year, several people have been convicted for their roles in the rioting, with the first conviction seen in May, when a 34-year-old migrant was convicted for rioting and attempting to seriously assault a police officer in the no-go Stockholm suburb of Rinkeby on Good Friday.

Follow Chris Tomlinson on Twitter at @TomlinsonCJ or email at ctomlinson(at)breitbart.com.

 

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