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Sweden school attack: police treat killing of pupil and teacher as racist hate crime Sweden school attack: police treat killing of pupil and teacher as racist hate crime
(about 2 hours later)
Swedish police are treating the killing of a pupil and a teacher at a school as a racist hate crime, while the country reacts with horror to its deadliest incidence of school violence for more than half a century. The double murders by a masked man in a school in south-west Sweden on Thursday was a suspected hate crime, police confirmed on Friday morning, as more details emerged about the attacker and his victims.
Local media named the sword-wielding attacker as 21-year-old Anton Lundin Pettersson. He died after being shot by police. “We are convinced there is a hate crime motive,” police told broadcaster SVT on Friday. Police said the attacker had left behind “a kind of suicide note” in his apartment and appeared to have planned the attack.
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His victims were a 17-year-old male pupil and a teacher, both of whom died of stab wounds. A 14-year-old boy and a 41-year-old teacher remain in hospital in critical condition. His victims were a 15-year-old male pupil and a teacher, both of whom died of stab wounds. A 14-year-old boy and a 41-year-old teacher remain in hospital in critical condition.
The assailant, who posed with students before the attack at Kronan school in Trollhättan, an industrial city near Gothenburg, was shot dead by police. The school has a high proportion of pupils with an immigrant background. The assailant, named by media as Anton Lundin Pettersson, 21, was shot dead by police. Kronan school in Trollhättan, an industrial city near Gothenburg, has a high proportion of pupils with an immigrant background.
“We can confirm that this was a racially motivated hate crime partially because the man chose his victims based on the colour of their skin,” Police Chief Niclas Hallgren told Swedish public service radio. “We have reached this conclusion based on what we found when we searched his apartment and his behaviour during the act, and also on the basis of how he selected his victims.” Police chief, Niclas Hallgren, told Swedish public service radio: “We can confirm that this was a racially motivated hate crime partially because the man chose his victims based on the colour of their skin.”
Earlier, investigator Thord Haraldsson told reporters that police were able to piece together the killer’s movements “by following the blood on the floor” that dripped from his weapon. Investigators searched the suspect’s address, and their findings, together with the clothes the attacker wore and the way he selected his victims, were the basis for investigating the incident as a hate crime, according to Västra Götaland police.
On Thursday evening, dozens of people gathered to pay their respects outside the school, whose pupils range in age from pre-school to high school, many of them the children of immigrants. Some stood outside the school, holding a vigil and carrying posters reading “Why?” and “Why kill?”. “We are convinced he was alone at the crime scene. But we are investigating whether he has had contact with someone else. We are going through his data and telephone traffic,” said spokesperson Peter Adlersson.
“This is a black day for Sweden,” Prime Minister Stefan Löfven said of the attack. “It is a tragedy that hits the entire country.” The suspected attacker was described by a local man as quiet and reclusive. He liked heavy metal music and hated hip-hop. On his Facebook and YouTube pages he liked and shared movies that glorified Nazi Germany.
Löfven, who cancelled his scheduled programme and rushed to Trollhättan, placing a bouquet of roses outside the front door of the school, declined to comment on Swedish media reports that the attacker had right-wing sympathies, saying that police were still trying to establish his profile. Pettersson had recently signed up to a campaign by the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats party for a referendum to halt refugees coming to Sweden, but he had no obvious political affiliation. He had no criminal record.
Several reports told how the suspect came into the school wearing a Darth Vader-like mask, a cape and carrying a sword. “I am your father,” he reportedly said, but then was silent.
One of the students asked if they could be photographed with him; the masked man nodded but did not say a word.
The first attacks took place just inside the school entrance, where the cafeteria is open to the public. Teaching assistant Lavin Eskandar, 20, challenged him to take off his mask, yelled at children to run and tried to overpower the attacker, but he was cut down and died at the scene.
Ahmed Hassan, 15, was also stabbed and died later of his wounds. He was sitting in a class when the killer knocked on the door. Hassan opened it and was stabbed in the abdomen, according to reports.
Hassan was born in Somalia and moved to Sweden three years ago. His mother described him as a cheerful boy who loved to play football.
“This offence has echoes of the 1980s Laser Man [when a racist shot immigrants in Malmö],” said interior minister Anders Ygeman, adding that the government would do everything to combat race hatred in society.
Still fighting for their lives at North Älvsborg county hospital are a 15-year-old boy and a 41-year-old maths teacher.
“These are families who have come to Sweden quite recently to seek safety,” Mona Sahlin, Sweden’s national coordinator against violent extremism, told Expressen TV.
The spread of online racism had to be taken seriously, she said: “It is our reality.”
Trollhättan is a city with high unemployment, extreme segregation, and a long history of hate crime – the first mosque to be burnt down in Sweden in the early 1990s was in the city, which is known for a hardcore of rightwing extremists, said Ove Sernhede, professor of social work at Gothenburg University.
“During the last few weeks we have seen arson or attempted arson attacks on asylum lodging reported every day. And now these tragic events in Trollhättan,” Sernheded said.
“There are a lot of activities in social media where extreme rightwing activist fuel each other and urge actions like burning down asylum lodgings. We must ask why the police, as well as the media, are mainly focused on jihadists and the threat from extreme Islamists, while not not taking the rightwing extremist violence seriously. After all, we have an history of extreme rightwing hate crime in Sweden.”
On Thursday evening, dozens of people gathered to pay their respects outside the school, whose pupils range in age from pre-school to high school, many of them the children of immigrants. Some stood outside the school, holding a vigil and carrying posters reading “Why?” and “Why kill?”
“This is a black day for Sweden,” the prime minister, Stefan Löfven, said of the attack. “It is a tragedy that hits the entire country.”
Löfven, who cancelled his scheduled programme and rushed to Trollhättan, placing a bouquet of roses outside the front door of the school, declined to comment on Swedish media reports that the attacker had rightwing sympathies, saying that police were still trying to establish his profile.
The anti-racist organisation Expo, citing reliable sources, said it knew the identity of the attacker, who “during the past month showed clear sympathies with the extreme right and anti-immigration movements”.The anti-racist organisation Expo, citing reliable sources, said it knew the identity of the attacker, who “during the past month showed clear sympathies with the extreme right and anti-immigration movements”.
Mobile phone images of the suspect show a man in a helmet resembling that used by the Nazis, holding a sword and wearing what was described as a Star Wars mask. According to several witnesses, he allowed himself to be photographed with students, who took it to be a Halloween prank.
Police said the man carried more than one weapon, including “at least one knife-like object”.
Fourteen-year-old student David Issa saw the assailant stab his teacher. “We were sitting in the [school’s] cafe and then this guy came up who was wearing a mask and carrying a sword and he stabbed my teacher. I panicked and ran away,” he said.
Ahmed Hadi, a 25-year-old mathematics teacher at the school, said: “I saw a masked man wearing black clothes coming up the stairs, he was carrying a sword covered with blood.
“He moved to another classroom. The kids were scared. We turned the lights off, and put desks behind the door. We asked the kids to sit down and be calm. They’re only 10 years old,” he said. The assailant was eventually gunned down by police in the hallway outside Hadi’s classroom.
Amal Ahmed, mother of seven-year-old pupil Susan, said her daughter was terrified by the horror of what she witnessed.
“My daughter ... has been crying and talking the whole day about the blood she saw,” she said. “We are from Iraq. We left our country for security here in Sweden. We don’t want violence, especially for our kids,” she added.
Sweden’s King Carl XVI Gustaf said the entire country was in shock and that the royal family had received the news “with great dismay and sadness”.Sweden’s King Carl XVI Gustaf said the entire country was in shock and that the royal family had received the news “with great dismay and sadness”.
The last school attack was in 1961, when a 17-year-old man opened fire at a school dancehall in the south-western part of the country, wounding seven students, one of whom died later. Violent crime is rare in the country, which has strict gun-control laws. In 2013, there were 87 homicides reported in Sweden, a country of about 10 million people. The last school attack was in 1961, when a 17-year-old man opened fire at a school dancehall in the south-western part of the country, wounding seven students, one of whom later died. Violent crime is rare in the country, which has strict gun-control laws. In 2013, there were 87 homicides reported in Sweden, a country of about 10 million people.
But the tragedy in Trollhättan has forced Swedes to ask if the traditional openness of their society may be putting pupils and teachers at risk. The school’s cafeteria and library were open to the public.
In June, the Swedish schools inspectorate fined the city council 600,000 kronor (£46,000) for “substantial shortcomings in the areas of security and the study environment” at Kronan school.