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[N.S.: At least the Trib did provide this photograph.] Firefighters extinguish a burning car, following riots in the Stockholm suburb of Kista late Tuesday night. (Fredrik Sanberg/Scanpix/Reuters / May 22, 2013) |
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Posted by Nicholas Stix
[A tip 'o the hate to reader-researcher RC.]
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Unemployment, immigrant poverty fuel riots in Sweden
Reuters/Chicago Tribune
6:04 a.m. CDT, May 22, 2013
More than 200 teenagers and young adults attacked police and set fire to cars for a third consecutive night of rioting in the suburbs Stockholm, Sweden.
On Tuesday night, rioters attacked a police station in the Jakobsberg area in the northwest of the city. Two schools were damaged and an arts and crafts centre was set ablaze, despite a call for calm from Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt.
The riots in one of Europe's richest capitals have shocked a country that prides itself on a reputation for social justice, and fuelled a debate about how Sweden is coping with both youth unemployment and an influx of immigrants. [N.S.: Talk of "youth" and "immigrants" is redundant, the same way that American newspapers referring to the same people twice, when they speak of "minorities and the poor."]
"We've had around 30 cars set on fire last night, fires that we connect to youth gangs and criminals," Kjell Lindgren, spokesman for Stockholm police, said on Wednesday.
He said eight people had been arrested on Tuesday night, but there were no reports of injuries.
The riots appear to have been sparked by the police killing of a 69-year-old man wielding a machete in the suburb of Husby this month, which prompted accusations of police brutality.
"Everyone must pitch in to restore calm -- parents, adults," Reinfeldt told reporters on Tuesday.
After decades of practising the "Swedish model" of generous welfare benefits, Sweden has been reducing the role of the state since the 1990s, spurring the fastest growth in inequality of any advanced OECD economy.
While average living standards are still among the highest in Europe, governments have failed to substantially reduce long-term youth unemployment and poverty, which have affected immigrant communities worst.
Some 15 percent of the population is foreign-born, the highest proportion in the Nordic region. [My understanding is that the population of Malmo, Sweden is over 30 percent foreign-born.] Unemployment among those born outside Sweden stands at 16 percent, compared with 6 percent for native Swedes, according to OECD data.
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