Bloody gang wars, parents and children killed

On Monday night, a powerful explosion rocked the stairwell of an apartment block on the outskirts of Stockholm, injuring three people, and the next day at dawn another powerful blast took place at a house in Linkoping, injuring one. The same evening, a man was injured by a gunshot in the capital's metropolitan area. The police say that these crimes are all linked to internal conflicts within the same criminal gang, Foxtrot.

Stockholm, 2015. szeptember 12. Egy rendõr tájékoztatja a stockholmi pályaudvarra érkezõ illegális bevándorlókat 2015. szeptember 12-én. Ezen a napon mintegy 250 migráns érkezett vonattal a svéd fõvárosba. (MTI/EPA/Jonas Ektsromer) Fotó: Jonas Ektsromer

The number of bombings in Sweden this year has exceeded 130, a figure already significantly higher than the 90 cases recorded for the whole of last year. In 2023, it took only half a year for criminal gangs to reach that.

In September, there was a bombing almost every day.

During the winter and spring, two rival organized crime groups with immigrant backgrounds committed most of the shootings and bombings. In the autumn, however, Sweden's biggest drug trafficker, Rawa Majid, aka the Kurdish Fox, and his gang Foxtrot, were responsible for most of the violence. 

Born in Uppsala, Sweden, Majid, 27, fled Sweden in 2018 because there were multiple convictions against him. He went to the Kurdish region of Iraq and from there he apparently moved to Turkiye, from where he is currently running his Swedish criminal organization. Foxtrot's other leader, Ismail Abdo, also known as the Strawberry Man, recently turned against Majid, unleashing a wave of violence. 

After that, Abdo's 60-year-old mother was shot dead in her home on the outskirts of Uppsala on 7 September. This was followed by revenge attacks in another part of the city, this time against Majid's father-in-law and later his mother-in-law, who both survived the assaults.

In the space of a week, seven people – some of them innocent – were shot dead in Uppsala and the Swedish capital Stockholm, some 70 kilometers away. Meanwhile, the police say they have been able to prevent several violent attacks.

It is becoming increasingly common for rivals to settle scores with the family of their enemies. A shooting on Tuesday night left a man in his 60s injured. Even more shockingly, children, many of whom are gang members themselves, are falling victim to the raging wave of violence. 

Last week in Sweden, a prosecutor in Stockholm took the unusual decision to publish a photograph of one of the 13-year-old child victims.

Thirteen-year-old Milo was the victim of a brutal gang violence. He was shot and killed, and his body was dumped in a wooded area near Stockholm.

According to the prosecutor, the murder was committed in the context of 'gang crime.' The child's photo and story shocked the public that has grown increasingly indifferent about gang warfare. According to some sources, the incident even caused outrage in the criminal underworld.

13-year-old Milo is also a victim of gang warfare

There is a growing number of voices in Sweden blaming a misguided immigration policy for the rampant wave of violence. The right-wing-liberal Kristersson government has repeatedly admitted that too many people have been coming to the country for too long, and that integration failed to accompany the process. This view is not shared by everyone, with the leader of the Centre Party, for example, claiming on the program of  SVT public television last week that the wave of violence is not due to the admission of large numbers of immigrants. Muharrem Demirok added that he was proud that Sweden had taken in a lot of people after 2015 and wanted the country to continue to do so.
On Wednesday morning, the Swedish government held a crisis meeting attended by authorities, emergency services, municipalities, regional institutions, industry organizations and trade unions. According to the justice minister, Sweden is in a very serious situation. Gunnar Strommer said that criminal gangs use explosions in parallel with shootings as a means to threaten, intimidate and retaliate.

What makes the explosions particularly serious is that they affect a large number of innocent people,

the minister said.

The creation of a national licensing register for those entitled to possess explosives was one of the measures discussed at the meeting. This is necessary because in many instances criminals get hold of explosives used on construction sites. "No stick of dynamite should fall into the wrong hands," Minister for Civil Defense Carl-Oskar Bohlin said. The plan is to complete the register as early as next year, he said after the crisis meeting. According to an earlier bill, the penalties for weapons-related criminal offences, including possession of explosive devices, will double as of April 1 next year, following the Danish model. In addition, the government also wants to simplify communication between relevant actors, such as authorities, by removing currently existing confidentiality restrictions.

For years, the Swedish police and authorities have been losing the battle against gangs, and have failed to reduce or even contain violent crime despite promises from politicians and police leaders.

What can stop the violence linked to the Foxtrot gang is not within the power of  the police at this stage, according to a professor of criminology at Gavle University.

 

Amir Rostami told Svenska Dagbladet that the increasingly deadly conflict can come to a halt either if one side wins, meaning that the other is killed or incapacitated, or if one side admits defeat, or a truce is agreed, possibly mediated by a third party.

In Sweden, attention is now focused on the brutal wave of violence stemming from the internal conflict of the Foxtrot network. Even if the gang is subdued, one way or the other, there will remain plenty of time bombs ticking in the country. According to police estimate, there are approximately 200 organized crime groups in Sweden, involving roughly 5000 thousand criminals.

Cover photo: Policeman giving information to illegal immigrants arriving at Stockholm railway station on September 12,  2015 (Photo: MTI/EPA/Jonas Ektsromer)