At least three folks had been killed after a shootout at a Swedish hair salon on Tuesday, police and media stated, amid heightened nerves over gun violence within the Scandinavian nation.
The taking pictures erupted within the centre of Uppsala a day earlier than a spring competition which attracts greater than 100,000 folks to the town some 60 kilometers (37 miles) north of Stockholm.
Police, who confirmed three useless, stated the assault was staged by a masked gunman. Media studies stated he escaped on an electrical scooter after the early night shootout.
Justice Minister Gunnar Strommer referred to as the killings “extremely serious” however police wouldn’t say if it was the newest episode in a protracted working conflict between gangs. Sweden can also be nonetheless recovering from its worst mass taking pictures in February.
“We have three people confirmed dead, but we have not confirmed their identities yet,” police spokesperson Magnus Jansson Klarin instructed Agence France-Presse (AFP).
“We received reports of a masked person on an electric scooter, we are looking into those reports,” he stated, including that door-to-door inquiries had been being carried out across the scene of the taking pictures.
Swedish media stated witnesses heard a number of pictures at a hair salon within the middle of the town.
The SVT public broadcaster stated one of many victims had been a suspect in an investigation right into a deliberate assault in opposition to a relative of a gang chief, Ismail Abdo.
“It’s normally a quiet neighbourhood, I do my shopping here every day,” Elias Sundgren, a pupil on the native college, instructed AFP.
Gang violence
The taking pictures got here a day earlier than Uppsala holds the Valborg competition to mark the beginning of spring. While police sealed off the streets across the hair salon – and a drone flew overhead – they sought to reassure the massive variety of guests anticipated.
“People should not be afraid to come tomorrow,” Klarin stated.
“There are 100,000 to 150,000 people expected in Uppsala for Valborg tomorrow, and there are already a whole lot here today.”
On Feb. 4, the nation was rocked by its worst mass taking pictures when 35-year-old Rickard Andersson entered the Campus Risbergska grownup schooling centre within the metropolis of Orebro and shot useless 10 folks earlier than turning the gun on himself.
But the Nordic nation has struggled for years to rein in shootings and bombings linked to score-settling between rival gangs. Earlier this month, two folks had been killed in suspected gang violence in Gothenburg. A famend rapper was shot useless in a gang battle in Gothenburg final yr.
Perpetrators are sometimes younger teenagers who’re employed as contract killers as a result of they’re beneath 15, the age of felony accountability in Sweden. The variety of reported gang deaths fell in 2024 nonetheless.
In the nation of 10.6 million folks, 92 circumstances of lethal violence had been recorded in 2024, 29 fewer than 2023, and the bottom degree since 2014, based on official knowledge.
There had been 296 reported taking pictures circumstances in 2024, a 20 p.c lower from the yr earlier than, based on the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention (Bra).
Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson’s center-right minority authorities, which is backed in parliament by the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats, got here to energy in 2022 with a vow to get powerful on crime.
Source: www.dailysabah.com