Over the weekend, a far-right and anti-Islam Danish group live-streamed video of its leader burning the Koran — Islam’s holy book — in different Swedish cities, sparking serious clashes that left three injured.
A car burns before a demonstration planned by Danish anti-Muslim politician Rasmus Paludan and his Stram Kurs party in Norrköping, Sweden, on April 17. Uproar and serious clashes have broken out since Thursday in Sweden on the fringes of rallies by a far-right and anti-Islam Danish group, which planned to burn Korans in several towns. On Sunday, police said three people were injured after apparently being hit by police bullets during a clash.
During demonstrations on Friday, protesters and counterprotesters clashed in the central city of Orebro. On Saturday, clashes occurred in the southwestern city of Malmö, which the Swedish police described as a “messy night” with many “disturbances in the forms of fire and attacks on the police,” as well as Molotov cocktails and stones thrown. Vehicles, including a city bus, were set on fire.
. They “seem to have been hit by ricochets,” the police said in a statement, adding that the three were not seriously injured but were receiving medical care.to “go home.” Johansson labeled Paludan a “right-wing extremist fool, whose only goal is to drive violence and divisions” but added that “Sweden is a democracy and in a democracy, fools also have freedom of speech.”In 2019, his party came close to entering parliament in Denmark.