عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
World

Counterintelligence Police: Sweden has Thwarted Iranian Attack Plots

Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson arrives for an EU summit in Brussels, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)
Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson arrives for an EU summit in Brussels, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)
TT
TT

Counterintelligence Police: Sweden has Thwarted Iranian Attack Plots

Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson arrives for an EU summit in Brussels, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)
Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson arrives for an EU summit in Brussels, Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024. (AP Photo/Omar Havana)

A senior member of the Swedish security police said Thursday that Iran has planned attacks on the country, days after local media reported that two Iranians were deported for a plot to kill three Swedish Jews several years ago.
Earlier this week, Swedish broadcast SR reported that two Iranians had been suspected of planning to kill members of the Swedish Jewish community. They were arrested in 2021 and were expelled from Sweden in 2022 without charges, according to Swedish radio.
According to The Associated Press, Daniel Stenling, counterespionage head at Sweden’s domestic security agency, told SR on Thursday that Iran “has been preparing and conducted activities aimed at carrying out a so-called physical attack against someone or something in Sweden.”
He added, "we have worked on a number of such cases where we have, as we gauge it, thwarted such preparations.” He declined to give specifics.
The two deported Iranians sought asylum in the Scandinavian country in 2015, claiming to be Afghans, and eventually got shelter in Sweden, according to SR. The report identified them as Mahdi Ramezani and Fereshteh Sanaeifarid, and said they have links to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.
A Swedish prosecutor earlier confirmed to The Associated Press that the two, a man and woman, were suspected of planning to carry out an attack “deemed to be terror” and that they have been expelled from Sweden. Prosecutor Hans Ihrman did not say when.
Ihrman told the AP that the prosecution “failed to get the necessary evidence that had been a prerequisite to be able to bring charges.” He also declined to give further details.
SR said the Iranians arrived in Sweden in 2015 as hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers sought to Europe. Sweden, with a population of 10 million, took in a record 163,000 migrants in 2015 — the highest per capita of any European country.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said Wednesday the report was “very serious.”
“We have had too many people in Sweden entering on the wrong grounds and who were not stopped at the border,” Kristersson said. “It is extremely important that dangerous people are stopped if they try to enter.”
The security agency earlier has said that Iran was active in Sweden and has been described as one of the countries that pose the greatest intelligence threat to Sweden.
“But I can’t go into detail about what it’s about, because then I’d reveal what we’re doing,” Stenling told SR.

Most Viewed

 
 
World

A Russian Ballistic Missile with Cluster Munitions Kills 11 People and Injures 84 in Ukraine's North

FILE - Ukrainian forces shoot toward Russian positions at the front line in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, on Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)
FILE - Ukrainian forces shoot toward Russian positions at the front line in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, on Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)
TT
TT

A Russian Ballistic Missile with Cluster Munitions Kills 11 People and Injures 84 in Ukraine's North

FILE - Ukrainian forces shoot toward Russian positions at the front line in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, on Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)
FILE - Ukrainian forces shoot toward Russian positions at the front line in Kharkiv region, Ukraine, on Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2022. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)

A Russian ballistic missile with cluster munitions struck a residential area of a northern Ukraine city, killing 11 people including two children and injuring 84 others, officials said Monday.
The two children killed in the strike on Sumy late Sunday were a 9-year-old boy and a 14-year-old girl, the regional prosecutor’s office said. Six injured children are in critical condition, it said.
The attack damaged 15 buildings, including two educational facilities, the prosecutor’s office said. A search and rescue operation continued Monday, on the eve of the war’s 1,000-day milestone.
Sumy lies 40 kilometers (24 miles) from the Russian border, The Associated Press said/
Also Sunday, US President Joe Biden authorized for the first time the use of US-supplied longer-range missiles by Ukraine to strike inside Russia, after extensive lobbying by Ukrainian officials.
The weapons are likely to be used in response to North Korea’s decision to send thousands of troops to support Russia in the Kursk region where Ukraine mounted a military incursion over the summer.
It is the second time the US has permitted the use of Western weapons inside Russian territory within limits after permitting the use of HIMARS systems, a shorter-range weapon, to stem Russia’s advance in Ukraine’s Kharkiv region in May.
The first reaction from Ukraine to the long-awaited decision from the US was notably restrained.
“Today, much is being said in the media about us receiving permission for the relevant actions. But strikes are not made with words. Such things are not announced. The missiles will speak for themselves,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address.
Earlier, Zelenskyy said that Russia had launched a total of 120 missiles and 90 drones in a large-scale attack across Ukraine, including Sumy. Russia deployed various types of drones, he said, including Iranian-made Shaheds, as well as cruise, ballistic and aircraft-launched ballistic missiles.
The attack, which targeted Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, came as fears are mounting about Moscow’s intentions to devastate Ukraine’s power generation capacity ahead of the winter.
Ukrainian defenses shot down 144 out of a total of 210 air targets, Ukraine’s air force reported.
“The enemy’s target was our energy infrastructure throughout Ukraine. Unfortunately, there is damage to objects from hits and falling debris. In Mykolaiv, as a result of a drone attack, two people were killed and six others were injured, including two children,” Zelenskyy said.
Two more people were killed in the Odesa region, where the attack damaged energy infrastructure and disrupted power and water supplies, said local Gov. Oleh Kiper. Both victims were employees of Ukraine’s state-owned power grid operator, Ukrenergo, the company said hours later.
The combined drone and missile attack was the most powerful in three months, according to the head of Kyiv’s City Military Administration, Serhii Popko.
One person was injured after the roof of a five-story residential building caught fire in Kyiv’s historic center, according to Popko.
A thermal power plant operated by private energy company DTEK was “seriously damaged,” the company said.
Russian strikes have hammered Ukraine’s power infrastructure since Moscow’s all-out invasion of its neighbor in February 2022, prompting repeated emergency power shutdowns and nationwide rolling blackouts. Ukrainian officials have routinely urged Western allies to bolster the country’s air defenses to counter assaults and allow for repairs.
Russia’s Defense Ministry on Sunday acknowledged carrying out a “mass” missile and drone attack on “critical energy infrastructure” in Ukraine, but claimed all targeted facilities were tied to Kyiv’s military industry.
Although Ukraine’s nuclear plants were not directly impacted, several electrical substations on which they depend suffered further damage, the UN’s nuclear energy watchdog said in a statement Sunday. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, only two of Ukraine’s nine operational reactors continue to generate power at full capacity.
The Russian military said Monday it intercepted and destroyed 59 Ukrainian drones overnight over several Russian regions. Two were downed over the Moscow region that surrounds the Russian capital, and three others over the neighboring Tula region. A total of 54 drones were destroyed over the Bryansk, Kursk and Belgorod regions on the border with Ukraine, according to a statement by the Russian Defense Ministry.
Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said the drones shot down outside of Moscow were heading toward the capital.