Swedes still shun bodyguards

2003-09-11 13:27

Stockholm - The fatal knife attack on Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh has launched an intense debate on the security of top politicians in Sweden, 17 years after the murder of then prime minister Olof Palme traumatised the country.

Lindh, 46, died early on Thursday of massive internal bleeding, a day after she was stabbed in the arm, abdomen and chest by an unknown assailant while shopping at a crowded Stockholm department store.

Lindh, like Palme, was not accompanied by bodyguards, a fact that has drawn scathing criticism for the security police whose responsibility it is to protect government members.

Yet in the open society Swedes so staunchly defend, where politicians and celebrities buy their groceries at the local shop and take the commuter train along with everyone else, the politicians themselves say they do not want bodyguards.

Security an obstacle

They view security as an obstacle to establishing direct contact with the people they represent and the "ordinary" lives they live.

Politicians and observers immediately drew parallels with the February 1986 murder of Palme, who was walking in the street with his wife and no bodyguards when he was shot dead by an unknown attacker.

And some wondered whether Sweden had failed to learn its lesson from the assassination.

"When a leading politician in such a critical political situation can move about in Stockholm city without a bodyguard, someone has drawn the wrong conclusion," Sweden's leading daily Dagens Nyheter blasted on Thursday.

"The days should be gone when security police can leave a cabinet minister without protection, especially during a controversial period in politics which stirs up a lot of emotion," Svenska Dagbladet said, noting that the attack on Lindh came just days before a planned referendum on the euro, in which she had been a high-profile campaigner.

Shocking

"It is shocking that this can happen in Sweden again," said Deputy Prime Minister Margareta Winberg, calling the assault "an attack on the model of an open democratic Sweden".

The head of Sweden's security police, Kurt Malmstroem, admitted that the police's conclusion that Lindh did not need a bodyguard - because they saw no threat to her person - had been a "failure".

"That is the least one can say," Prime Minister Goeran Persson said tersely.

However, in announcing Lindh's death to reporters, Persson also called on Swedes to defend their unique society.

"Our country is known for its openness, known for being a democratic society where the people and their elected representatives are and should be very close, a tolerant society unique in its closeness," he said.

"We wanted to have a society where all people can move freely and safely, even a foreign minister. We wanted to have a society that is safe for everyone. And what is needed right now is unity.

"The democratic society can never be defended in any other way," he said.

Despite Lindh's death, Left Party leader Ulla Hoffmann agreed, it was important for politicians to maintain Sweden's open society "so that people can still approach us ... that is important for democracy."

"I hope this will not change the basics" of society, Green Party leader Peter Eriksson added.

Liberal party leader Lars Leijonborg said he did not think that political leaders should automatically have bodyguards in the future.

"Absolutely not, it would not be realistic," he said.

- AFP