STOCKHOLM — Sweden’s gang violence has escalated to the point where its homicide rate linked to gang warfare is now one of the highest in Europe, with shooters often being minors.
There is an average of one shooting per day for every 10 million inhabitants, and in 2023, 53 people were killed in shootings.
Fifty kilometers from the Swedish port city of Malmö, journalists met with a young man who wishes to remain anonymous.
He alleges that he started out at the age of 14 as a drug trafficker, but these days he carries out a variety of orders like planting explosions or committing shootings.
Ads are placed on encrypted messaging platforms. He claims to earn an average of €7,000 a month.
“To blow up a door in Malmö costs €3,000. Then to kill someone it’s €80,000 in Malmö, Stockholm it’s €50,000,” he said.
“I’ve never killed, but I’ve hurt people.”
As the violence becomes more widespread, criminals are turning to minors, who face juvenile justice rather than life sentences in the adult system, for contract killings.
In the first half of this year, local media reported that the number of suspects under the age of 15 involved in murder was nearly four times higher than last year.
After winning national elections two years ago, the new center-right government took over a country so violent that only Albania and Montenegro are ahead of it in the rankings of gun deaths per capita within Europe.
To combat the shootings linked to organized crime and shattering the previously idyllic image associated with the country, Sweden has taken steps to rectify the situation.
In early October, the Swedish government proposed a law allowing anonymous testimonies to break the code of silence within gangs.
Stockholm fired back at criticism that this proposal would violate the rule of law, which holds that the accused have the right to know who they must defend themselves against.
Anonymous testimony would only be allowed in exceptional cases, at the court’s discretion and for crimes punishable by at least two years in prison.
There must also be a tangible risk that the witnesses or their relatives could be victims of a serious crime due to their testimony. — Euronews