Swedish police say police have injured three people in the eastern city of Norrkoping as protesters protest plans by a far-right group to burn copies of the Koran.
“Police fired several warning shots. Three people appear to have been hit by ricochets and are currently being treated at a hospital, police said in a statement.
The three wounded have been arrested, police said, adding that their condition is unknown.
Sunday’s clashes in Norrkoping were the second in four days. For the first time, protesters protested against a rally by the anti-immigration and anti-Islamic group Hard Line, led by Danish-Swedish politician Rasmus Paludan.
On Sunday, they reunited to protest another rally, which Paludan eventually abandoned.
Four people were arrested among the approximately 150 participants as protesters threw stones at employees and cars were set on fire, police said.
According to health services, quoted by the local news agency TT, 10 people were hospitalized with minor injuries following clashes in Norrkoping and similar unrest in the neighboring town of Linköping, where Hard Line also refused to demonstrate.
Paludan, 40, who intends to run in the Swedish legislative elections in September but does not yet have the required number of signatures to secure his candidacy, is on a “tour” in Sweden. He visits neighborhoods with a large Muslim population, where he wants to burn copies of the Qur’an.
People set fire to branches to block a road before a demonstration in Norrkoping on Sunday. Photo: TT / Reuters
Lawyer and YouTuber, he has previously been convicted of racist insults. In 2019, he burned a Koran wrapped in bacon and was blocked for a month by Facebook after a post mixing immigration and crime.
On Saturday, one of his rallies was moved from the Landskrona district to an isolated car park in the southern part of Malmö, a large neighboring town, but a car tried to break through the protective barriers. The driver was arrested and Paludan then burned the Koran.
The Hard Line tour has sparked several clashes between police and counter-protesters in the Scandinavian country in recent days. About 12 police officers were injured in the clashes on Thursday and Friday.
Following the incidents, the Iraqi Foreign Ministry said it had summoned the Swedish interim in Baghdad on Sunday.
It said the affair could have “serious consequences” for “relations between Sweden and Muslims in general, both Muslim and Arab countries and Muslim communities in Europe”.
In November 2020, Paludan was arrested in France and deported. Five other activists were arrested in Belgium shortly afterwards, accused of wanting to “spread hatred” by burning the Koran in Brussels.
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