Swedish police have arrested a man they suspect rammed a hijacked beer delivery truck into a crowd in central Stockholm on Friday, killing four people and wounding more than a dozen in what they called a terror crime.
While police declined to comment on the identity or possible motive of the man, who was detained in a northern Stockholm suburb, Swedish public radio, citing unnamed sources, said he was from Uzbekistan.
“The person in question has been arrested as the culprit ... in this case, the driver,” police spokesman Lars Bystrom said of the attack, adding that authorities were not ruling out the possibility that he had accomplices, although only one person had been taken into custody.
Photo: AFP
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack and police said security at Sweden’s borders had been heightened and traffic restricted on the Oresund Bridge linking Denmark and Sweden.
Vehicles have in the past year been used as weapons in Berlin, London and Nice, France, in attacks claimed by the Islamic State.
The attack stunned Sweden, which has so far been largely immune from any major incidents of this kind.
“I think it was just a matter of time, but still, one doesn’t think it will happen,” 25-year-old nurse Cecilia Hansson said. “It’s still unreal when it happens this close.”
Police declined to comment on a report by public broadcaster SVT that said a bag containing a homemade bomb had been found in the truck.
SVT said the bomb might have partly exploded, burning the driver.
The beer truck, hijacked on Drottninggatan (Queen Street) in central Stockholm, plowed through crowds before ramming into the Ahlens department store. The driver escaped in the ensuing chaos, with people fleeing from the area.
Local authorities in the capital, where flags flew at half-mast on buildings including the legislature and royal palace, said that 10 people including a child were still hospitalized yesterday, adding that two adults were in intensive care.
A gaping hole in the wall of the department store showed the force of the impact from the truck, which was removed overnight for examination by forensics experts, while dozens of people gathered there to pay their respects and leave flowers.
Swedish Crown Princess Victoria was among them, laying a bouquet of red roses.
“I feel an enormous sadness, I feel empty,” she told Aftonbladet TV, urging Swedes to unite in their grief.
In a nearby open-air market, owners returned to abandoned fruit and vegetable stalls after a defiant message from Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven.
“You will not defeat us, you will not govern our lives, you will never, ever win,” Lofven, who described the assault as a terrorist attack, said late on Friday.
Police said it was especially difficult to identify “lone wolf” attackers in an open, Nordic society.
“It is very hard if it is a single individual who is not part of a wider conspiracy or a more organized planning, but we have to find these individuals as well,” Swedish Security Service Director-General Anders Thornberg told Swedish radio.
Police in Norway’s largest cities and at Oslo Airport, Garderoen are to carry weapons until further notice following the attack.
Sweden has not fought a war in more than 200 years, but its military has taken part in UN peacekeeping missions in several conflict zones, including Iraq, Mali and Afghanistan.
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