Richard Orange

Journalist and Editor

Sweden

0046727200156
[email protected]

Portfolio
DW.COM
12/03/2020
Is there enough wood in the world to feed sustainability? | DW | 01.05.2020

The harvesting machine takes just one second to fell the towering spruce, and another to strip the branches and scan its trunk for defects. "This one is very straight," operator Antonio Petersson Kvennefelt says of the trunk gripped by the arm of his machine, as a screen in front of him flashes with data.

Prospectmagazine
Will Sweden's herd immunity experiment pay off?

I f I've learnt one thing in a decade living in Sweden, it is that it is boring. Its respectful, consensus-driven politics has little of Westminster's drama, and the highly-independent government bodies responsible for the day-to-day running of things-known collectively as myndigheterna (the agencies)-value rule and procedure above radical ideas.

the Guardian
04/19/2020
Anger in Sweden as elderly pay price for coronavirus strategy

It was just a few days after the ban on visits to his mother's nursing home in the Swedish city of Uppsala, on 3 April, that Magnus Bondesson started to get worried."They [the home] opened up for Skype calls and that's when I saw two employees.

the Guardian
04/19/2020
Anger in Sweden as elderly pay price for coronavirus strategy

It was just a few days after the ban on visits to his mother's nursing home in the Swedish city of Uppsala, on 3 April, that Magnus Bondesson started to get worried."They [the home] opened up for Skype calls and that's when I saw two employees.

The Telegraph
04/05/2020
Why the Swedes are tackling coronavirus differently

For now, Sweden remains open. But will a rising death roll see the country change its 'herd immunity' approach? In the middle of last week, I emerged blinking into the spring sun after ten days of self-imposed coronavirus isolation - my wife, Mia and I had developed temperatures over 38C, aches, and coughs - to find Malmö, the Swedish city where we live, curiously unchanged.

the Guardian
03/28/2020
As the rest of Europe lives under lockdown, Sweden keeps calm and carries on

If there's been a fall in custom at the Nyhavn restaurant, it's hardly noticeable. Groups of drinkers huddle under heat lamps out on Möllevång Square, the centre of nightlife in the Swedish city of Malmö, seemingly oblivious to the virus spreading through Europe. "It's the Swedish trust in government," says Elias Billman, 22.

The Telegraph
03/26/2020
Sweden keeps schools and borders open in 'huge experiment' on virus

Swedish children continued to pour through the gates of their schools and kindergartens on Thursday as the Nordic nation stood increasingly alone in Europe in its approach to tackling the coronavirus pandemic. Shops and restaurants also remained open across the country, with parks and recreational areas packed with groups enjoying the spring sunshine.

SoundCloud
03/12/2020
Living Planet: Growing solutions by DW English

As governments strive to wean themselves off fossil fuels, we visit Sweden to find out why wood could be key for a net-zero carbon future. We'll also head to Brazil, where activists are replanting trees obliterated by last year's catastrophic fires.

the Guardian
02/22/2020
Teenage transgender row splits Sweden as dysphoria diagnoses soar by 1,500%

For several days this week the veteran Swedish journalist Malou von Sivers will cover the same topic in every episode of her nightly TV chat show: the extraordinary rise in diagnoses of gender dysphoria among teenage girls. Lukas Romson, one of the country's leading trans activists, is prepared for the worst.

the Guardian
01/23/2020
Indigenous reindeer herders win hunting rights battle in Sweden

A group of indigenous reindeer herders has won a 30-year battle to take back exclusive rights to hunting and fishing across a swathe of Arctic Sweden, in an important ruling for the Sami people's struggle to control their ancestral land.

the Guardian
01/11/2020
Pippi Longstocking: can the world's strongest girl conquer Britain?

She heaves a circus strongman above her head and tosses policemen into bushes, vanquishes hapless burglars and wrongfoots the uptight, bourgeois woman who wants her put into a children's home. Yet Pippi Longstocking, the girl with the freckles and protruding pigtails, has not yet won a place on every British child's bedside table.

Silverkris
Frozen North

Cover story in Singapore Airlines' in-flight magazine.

the Guardian
01/18/2020
My happy place: where European locals immerse themselves in nature

Jannet Aksnes, 46, from Flåm Jannet Aksnes, 46, from Flåm When I walk down the rocky beach and into the freezing Aurlandsfjord, I'm almost in a trance. I have to be. To concentrate fully, to lock everything else out and to force myself not to feel the cold is the only way I can cope with the temperature.

DW.COM
11/21/2019
Swedish town to integrate refugees by housing them with pensioners | DW | 14.12.2019

The first time the young immigrant men met their future Swedish neighbors, it was Kristin Ohman (photo above) who made contact. "They were standing alone so I came over to meet them and I gave them some flowers," the 74-year-old smiles, as she remembers the gathering of the 70 people hand-picked to live in her new apartment building.

The Telegraph
12/07/2019
The Swedish housing experiment that brings everyone together

The first thing Torbjörn Björk does on being introduced is apologise that the vast majority of Rosana Simson's new neighbours will be close to sixty years older than her. "I know we don't look so old now," the retired airline pilot booms as he greets her in the foyer.

DW.COM
07/06/2018
Living Planet: The Swedish town that upcycled itself | DW | 05.12.2019

A former steel town about an hour from Stockholm has found a way to address the problems of consumption and waste at their source and final destination - the shopping mall and the landfill. In an effort to reinvent the Swedish town of Eskilstuna after industry moved out in the 1970s, residents turned to upcycling.

DW.COM
09/27/2019
Inside Europe: Swedes resist Solvesborg's 'culture war' | DW | 01.11.2019

Louise Erixon, the new mayor of Solvesborg, Sweden, belongs to the populist political party Sweden Democrats. Her council has decided to no longer commission public art considered provocative. But some locals are fiercely resisting this 'cultural war' as Richard Orange has been finding out.

DW.COM
10/31/2019
Living Planet: Danish farmer returns land to peatlands | DW | 31.10.2019

The Danish government wants to put the country back at the forefront of fighting climate change. The country was a pioneer in developing commercial wind power, but this time farming, not energy is in the spotlight. A Danish farmer is starting a project, which if applied nationally, could offset the entire emissions of the capital, Copenhagen.

the Guardian
10/10/2019
US mayors seek to bypass Trump with direct role at UN climate talks

US mayors are seeking to go over President Trump's head and negotiate directly at next month's UN climate change conference in Santiago, they said as they met in Copenhagen for the C40 World Mayors Summit.Los Angeles mayor Eric Garcetti, who rallied US mayors to commit to the Paris climate agreement after Trump announced his intention to withdraw the country in 2017, said he would ask the UN secretary general, António Guterres, on Thursday to give American cities a new role in UN climate...

The Telegraph
10/08/2019
Swedish king removes five from royal family amid concern over cost to taxpayers

The King of Sweden has removed five of his grandchildren from the country's Royal Court in a historic step which has had Swedish republicans celebrating with Champagne. In his surprise decision on Monday, King Carl XVI Gustaf ruled that the children of Princess Madeleine and Prince Carl-Philip would from now on be treated as private citizens.

DW.COM
08/30/2019
Inside Europe: Skateboarding in Malmö | DW | 30.08.2019

Skateboarders have traditionally been at war with city authorities. But in Malmo, a city in consensual Sweden, the two work together. There's a city official who works solely on skateboarding, a skating high school, and now even a skating academic conference. Richard Orange has been finding out more.

the Guardian
07/04/2019
The penny drops: at last a female urinal for the festival crowd

It's the great injustice of festival life. While men don't have to think twice about it, for women the question of when and where to pee is always there. Do you brave a long queue and risk losing your friends, or are you drunk enough to relieve yourself in a more informal setting?

DW.COM
05/16/2019
Inside Europe: Swedes swap planes for trains | DW | 28.06.2019

There's a new word in Sweden: Flygskam. The shame people feel at the damage they are causing the climate by taking flights. And it is starting to have a real impact at the start of the Swedish holiday season. Richard Orange has been finding out more.

DW.COM
05/31/2019
Inside Europe: A Green Wave in the run-up to Danish polls | DW | 31.05.2019

In last weekend's European Parliamentary elections, green parties in Germany, France, Ireland, Finland, Austria, and the UK made historic gains. And in Denmark too the so-called Green Wave has left the major parties playing catch up ahead of Wednesday's general election, as Richard Orange reports.

The Telegraph
03/28/2019
'Doomsday vault' threatened by climate change

The site of the so-called 'Doomsday vault', designed to safeguard millions of the world's most genetically important seed from nuclear war, asteroid strikes and other disasters, is at threat from climate change, a new report has warned.

the Guardian
03/06/2019
Artificial archipelago: Copenhagen plans floating Silicon Valley

In the winter fog and drizzle, it is hard to imagine Køge Bugt beach park packed with families, joggers and swimmers. But in summer this artificial beach is one of Copenhagen's favourite spots. Backed by scrubby dunes and lagoons teeming with birds, the only thing spoiling the idyll is the power station that looms to the north.

The Telegraph
02/27/2019
Sweden detains suspected Russian spy

Sweden's security services have arrested a man working for a technology company on suspicion of spying for Russia, in a move likely to worsen growing tension between the countries. The man was arrested at a meeting with a Russian diplomat in central Stockholm on Tuesday evening by agents of the country's Säpo security service supported by police.

DW.COM
02/15/2019
Inside Europe: A comeback for conscription in Sweden | DW | 15.02.2019

Why would Russia want to attack Sweden, a neutral country? That was the thinking back in 2010, when Sweden abolished conscription. Then Russia annexed Crimea. In 2017, parliament voted to bring back the draft, as part of urgent moves to rebuild the country's Cold War system of Total Defence.

The Telegraph
02/03/2019
Sweden's first new conscripts prepare to repel Russian invaders

Evelina Lööf, 19, commander of one of the vehicles, is bright-eyed with adrenaline after her first exercise firing live rounds on the move. "The most dramatic moment was when we got to the field right in front of the sea," she says. "There were a lot of enemy vehicles.

The Telegraph
01/11/2019
Sweden's parties reach deal to keep far-Right Sweden Democrats from influence

Sweden's ruling coalition has struck a deal with two minority parties to maintain power and ensure that the far-Right Sweden Democrats cannot gain political influence after 124 days of deadlock. Annie Lööf, leader of the Centre Party, said on that her party had reached "a breakthrough" in talks with the Social Democrat, Green and Liberal Parties.

The Telegraph
01/09/2019
Kidnappers demand €9m in cryptocurrency for Norwegian billionaire's wife

The wife of one of Norway's richest men has been abducted from her home outside Oslo, with the kidnappers demanding a ransom of €9 million in cryptocurrency. Tom Hagen returned home on October 31 to find his wife Anne-Elisabeth Falkevik Hagen missing and a ransom note, written in bad Norwegian, threatening to kill her unless he made a payment of €9 million in the crypto currency Monero.

SilverKris
11/17/2018
On thin ice: Stockholm's long-distance skaters brave the elements - SilverKris

The last few northerly islands of the Åland archipelago, midway between Sweden and Finland, are just within sight. Otherwise, it is just ice, stretching as far as the eye can see. This particular type is known as nyis, or new ice - just a few days old and covered in a thin, shimmering layer of water.

TLS
No peace prize

The crisis at the Swedish Academy began in November 2017, when Jean-Claude Arnault, the husband of the Academy member Katarina Frostenson, was accused in an article in the Dagens Nyheter newspaper of sexually harassing or assaulting eighteen women.

The Telegraph
10/01/2018
Photographer at centre of Nobel row given two year jail term for rape

The woman's lawyer, Elisabeth Massi Fritz, hailed the judgement as "a victory for justice". "The court's verdict is a huge relief for my client," she told the Dagens Nyheter newspaper. "This judgement is important for many women, for the whole #MeToo movement, and for the culture of silence which exists around rape and sexual crime."

The Telegraph
09/19/2018
Rape trial begins for Frenchman at centre of Nobel scandal

The French cultural impresario whose alleged sexual assaults led to the postponement of this year's Nobel Prize in Literature denied all the charges against him on the first day of his trial on Wednesday. Jean-Claude Arnault, the husband of poet and Swedish Academy member Katarina Frostenson, is on trial accused of raping one woman on two separate occasions.

the Guardian
09/09/2018
'I want to stir up the stew': Swedish voters cast their ballots

For some, after a record summer heatwave and wildfires in the Arctic, it was about the environment. For others, it was about defending liberal democracy in a country taking a first step towards abandoning it. For many - more, certainly, than in any previous Swedish election - it was above all about frustration and a desire for radical change.

the Guardian
08/25/2018
Sweden's far right courts immigrant voters in bid to make historic gains

At the Malmedalen political festival in Rosengård, the Sweden Democrats tent was far and away the busiest. Inside, Jörgen Grubb was taking his message of restrictive immigration, draconian law and order, and Swedish cultural nationalism to a part of Malmö where close to 90% of people have a foreign background.

DW.COM
06/09/2018
Neo-Nazi background hounds Sweden Democrats | DW | 04.09.2018

Moments after Jimmie Akesson, the 39-year-old leader of the populist Sweden Democrats (SD), takes the microphone in Malmo, the chants begin to ring out. "No racists on our streets!" There are cardboard banners saying "Shut up, you bloody racist, and "SD: Nazis 1988, Nazis 2018."

Resurgence
Resurgence * Article - Greens Count the Cost of Power Sharing

Looking at the media coverage, however, you wouldn't know it. The Greens have been hammered in the press almost since the day they took office on 3 October 2014 as the junior partner in a Social Democrat-led government. In the election scheduled for 9 September this year, they will find out just what price they have paid for their place in power.

The Telegraph
06/18/2018
Sweden's preppers stock up for potential Russian attack

With its wooden outer wall painted in traditional 'falu red' paint, and pigs, ducks, chickens and geese in pens outside, the farmyard in a remote part of Scania, southern Sweden, is the very picture of rural calm. But the owners of this 190-year old house are preparing for a catastrophe.

The Telegraph
06/12/2018
Stockholm bans sexist advertising in public spaces

Stockholm has banned sexist advertising in public spaces, giving the authorities the power to forcibly remove offending images of women 24 hours after they are erected. Stockholm City Council voted on Monday to ban adverts which "present women or men as simply sex objects", "show a stereotypical image of gender roles", or "in any other demeaning fashion are obviously sexually discriminatory".

the Guardian
06/12/2018
French photographer at centre of Nobel row charged with rape

The French photographer at the centre of allegations of sexual assault, which contributed to the postponement of this year's Nobel prize in literature, has been charged with two cases of rape by prosecutors in Stockholm.Jean-Claude Arnault, who is married to a member of the body that awards the prize, faces

Sveriges Radio
08/04/2017
Reports

This is stuff I've done for Radio Sweden, Sveriges Radio's English language division. Very much still learning the ropes.

the Guardian
06/10/2018
Denmark swings right on immigration - and Muslims feel besieged

"It's a lovely place," says Jens Kramer, as he gazes across the harbour from his seat outside the wooden shed that serves as Holbæk's boat club. "But I think people here are becoming more and more hostile to foreigners and I'm not proud of it. It's not the Holbæk I love."

the Guardian
04/23/2018
Kim Wall murder trial: prosecutor demands life sentence

A Danish prosecutor has demanded a life sentence for the suspect in the killing of the Swedish journalist Kim Wall, saying he has changed his story so many times that his credibility is now "not only low, it is non-existent".

the Guardian
04/25/2018
Peter Madsen sentenced to life for murdering journalist Kim Wall

A Danish inventor has been sentenced to life in prison for the premeditated murder and sexual assault of the Swedish journalist Kim Wall in August last year. The judge, Anette Burkø, and two jurors found Peter Madsen, 47, guilty of all three of the main charges of premeditated murder, aggravated sexual assault and desecrating a corpse.

the Guardian
04/21/2018
Why road to Syria peace could begin in a sleepy Swedish farmhouse

The incessant trilling of the larks was still the dominant sound at Backåkra, a traditional 'fyrlängad' - a four-sided, half-timber farmhouse, overlooking a sun-bathed coastal heath sprinkled with purple flowers. But this peaceful, secluded corner of Österlen, the southeastern corner of the Swedish county of Skåne, will on Saturday be crawling with specialist security officers, diplomats and journalists as the UN security council meets for its annual retreat.

The Telegraph
04/11/2018
King of Sweden considers using royal powers to break Nobel deadlock

Sweden's King Carl XVI Gustaf has moved to break a deadlock at the scandal-hit committee that awards the Nobel Literature Prize, unveiling a plan on Wednesday to make it easier for members to resign. The king, whose forbear Gustav III founded the Swedish Academy in 1786, announced the rare employment of his royal powers in a statement released by the Royal Court.

the Guardian
04/05/2018
Danish inventor accused of Kim Wall murder 'psychopathic', court hears

A Danish inventor discussed dismembering the body of the Swedish journalist Kim Wall without emotion in interviews with forensic psychiatrists, and demonstrated no compassion for her or her family, Copenhagen district court has heard. "What do you do when you have a big problem?

The Telegraph
03/21/2018
Submarine killer 'thought of Se7en' as he cut off journalist's head

Danish submarine and rocket builder Peter Madsen told Danish police that he thought of the 1990s serial killer thriller Se7en as he cut off the head of Swedish journalist Kim Wall on board his submarine, it has emerged on the second day of his trial in Copenhagen.

the Guardian
03/08/2018
Danish inventor pleads not guilty to murder of journalist Kim Wall

A Danish builder of submarines and rockets went on trial on Thursday accused of sexually assaulting, torturing and murdering the Swedish journalist Kim Wall after she joined him on board his home-built submarine for an interview in August last year.

the Guardian
03/08/2018
Danish inventor denies murder of Kim Wall as trial opens

A Danish inventor has denied murdering the Swedish journalist Kim Wall on his homemade submarine, claiming that he had lied previously about how she died only to spare her relatives. "I deny that I am guilty of the murder of Kim Wall," Peter Madsen told the court in Copenhagen on the first day of his trial, after prosecutor Jakob Buch-Jepsen had presented a barrage of new detail.

the Guardian
01/28/2018
Ikea founder Ingvar Kamprad dies aged 91

Company says man who founded firm in 1943 aged 17 died peacefully at home in Sweden The founder of Sweden's Ikea furniture chain, Ingvar Kamprad, has died at the age of 91. The company said Kamprad, whom it described as "one of the greatest entrepreneurs of the 20th century", had "peacefully passed away at his home" on Saturday.

the Guardian
01/07/2018
A Copenhagen killing: the story behind the submarine murder

A bearded Icelander in a boiler suit starts pounding the exposed strings of the disembowelled piano in front of him, and the space below deck begins pulsating with distorted, echoing rhythms. To transform the sound, the man's plucking and palming is being run through a laptop, an iPad and other electronics by Andreas Wetterberg, a member of Illutron, a floating art collective moored off the Copenhagen peninsula of Refshaleøen.

the Guardian
01/06/2018
Hard-hitting film takes aim at Ingmar Bergman's flawed way with women

A new Swedish documentary commissioned for this year's centenary of the birth of Ingmar Bergman is to examine the sexual relationships in which the Swedish film director engaged with almost all of his actresses, and detail his shortcomings as a husband and father.

The Telegraph
09/05/2017
Danish submarine owner claims journalist Kim Wall died when she was hit by hatch cover

Swedish journalist Kim Wall died in an accident when she was hit by a heavy hatch cover on board a home-made submarine, the Danish owner of the submarine testified on court on Tuesday. Peter Madsen was holding the hatch for Wall as they sailed in the strait between Denmark and Sweden last month on a submarine he had built, he told a Danish court.

The Telegraph
10/01/2017
Peter Madsen supporters disband organisation after journalist died on his submarine

At a meeting called on Saturday, members of the Rocket Madsen Support Group first held a minute's silence for the Swedish journalist before its chairman Frederik Just gave an address. "His fall from grace is complete, immediate and deeply tragic," Mr Just said of Mr Madsen according to the Ekstra Bladet newspaper.

the Guardian
02/25/2017
Swedish suburb becomes a part of the Trump media circus

You don't have to look very hard in the Stockholm suburb of Rinkeby to identify some of the problem youths who ran riot here. As cars were set on fire and police were pelted with stones on Monday, Rinkeby found itself centre stage in the furore that followed Donald Trump's claim that immigration was bringing Sweden "problems like they never thought possible".

Resurgence
Sweden Begins The Shift From Fast to Thrift

Undercurrents Sweden Begins The Shift From Fast to Thrift Cover: Artwork by Angela Harding www.angelaharding.co.uk Issue availability Order the current issue now Issue available as PDF Reprint permissions Photo credit Erik Lund Once a month from spring to autumn, hundreds of stalls spring up in a park in Malmö, southern Sweden, from which parents sell off the clothes, toys and equipment their children have outgrown for as little as five kronor (50p) a pop.

POLITICO
02/10/2017
First we take Hässleholm ... Swedish far-right rises

HÄSSLEHOLM, Sweden - When the leader of the Moderates, Anna Kinberg Batra, recently announced that her party would be open to negotiating with the Sweden Democrats, it sent shockwaves through the establishment. Many accused Kinberg Batra of ripping up the cordon sanitaire which has prevented far-right populists in Sweden from winning the kind of influence they have achieved in neighboring Denmark and Norway, and elsewhere on the Continent.

The Telegraph
01/15/2017
Swedish school sparks backlash for gender segregated classes intended to help shy students

She said the change was a one-off intervention to "strengthen knowledge development" among certain pupils. "It's a good way to break the pattern, to reach students," she told the local Nerikes Allehanda newspaper, adding that her experience as a teacher had taught her that some girl pupils did not dare to speak or break negative behaviour patterns when surrounded by boys.

the Guardian
11/27/2016
Copenhagen sex ambulance is safe space for capital's red-light workers

Michael Lodberg Olsen rests his buttocks on the board that serves as a bed in Sexelance, his mobile sanctuary for street sex workers, and begins rocking back and forth, his eyes twinkling with amusement. "We thought of putting in something to stop this," he says, as the converted ambulance jumps up and down on its suspension.

The Telegraph
11/25/2016
Denmark's only three star restaurant fined for food hygiene failures

chef Rasmus Kofoed in February added his country's first three Michelin star rating to a list of accolades that includes being named the world's best chef at the prestigious Bocuse d'Or. But this week, he was in the newspapers for a less welcome award.

The Telegraph
11/10/2016
Facebook slammed for censoring burn victim's birthday photo

"They said that actually this is a regular occurrence when burn victims post something where you can clearly see the burns," he told the Telegraph. So when he posted the birthday message a third time, he encouraged others to share it. "Do you want to help me to speak out against a disgusting Facebook policy?

The Telegraph
04/02/2016
Anti-elite sentiment may lead to Brexit, warns PM's 'best friend'

David Cameron's so-called "best friend" in European politics has warned the Prime Minister that he has made a potentially catastrophic miscalculation by calling an EU referendum that could spark the "disintegration of Europe as we know it".

Telegraph.co.uk
01/31/2016
'Do we really want them here?' asks divided Sweden on refugee children

The argument became so heated that the moderator felt forced to delete the thread. Harlosa, deep in the conservative farming country outside the city of Lund, is set, within just a few weeks, to see its own home for twenty refugee youths opened in a house in the centre, just across from the local petrol station and supermarket.

TLS
Restless temperament

Leo Tolstoy displayed early on the wildness he would later come to regard as the Tolstoy family trait. As the household sat down to table, the boy took a running jump headfirst through the first-floor window above them, explaining, when he regained consciousness, that he had wanted to surprise everyone.

The Telegraph
09/16/2016
Norway slashes tourism adverts as it is overwhelmed thanks to 'Frozen effect'

The tourist board for Western Norway, the site of the country’s most magnificent fjords, has slashed its promotion budget for next summer after surging visitor numbers in the wake of the success of Disney's Frozen led to fully-booked hotels, traffic problems and queues at popular destinations.

Spirit Magazine
03/08/2016
ON TRACK

SWEDEN: Customers help Volvo CE develop special applications by Richard Orange here is a clattering sound, muffled by cold, damp air and then a train sweeps past, decked out in the pastel blue of Pågatåg, the regional operator in Skåne, Sweden's southernmost county. "Some of them go a

the Guardian
11/10/2016
ADHD Nation by Alan Schwarz review - investigating a £10bn industry

The first book I bought on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder did my marriage no good at all. The author, Melissa Orlov, told me and my wife that the passion and intensity with which our relationship had begun had not been true love, but instead a "hyperfocus courtship", a state of overexcitement symptomatic of the disorder.

Telegraph.co.uk
01/08/2016
Unprecedented sex harassment in Helsinki at New Year, Finnish police report

"Our information from these reception centres were that disturbances or other crimes would happen in the city centre. We were prepared for fights and sexual harrassment and thefts." He said that police had established a "very massive presence" to control the estimated 1,000 Iraqi asylum seekers who had gathered in the tunnels surrounding the central railway station by 11pm, many of whom appeared to be under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

DW.COM
10/01/2016
Refugee influx weighs on Swedish towns | Europe | DW.COM | 11.01.2016

The day the first refugees arrived at Sweden's first tent refugee camp deep in the countryside of southern Sweden, a note from a neo-Nazi organization dropped into the letterbox of everyone living nearby. "This area has been declared a National Socialist zone," it declared.

the Guardian
12/20/2015
Home alone nation: how the Danes fell in love with the idea of solitary living

Anyone who caught the Danish political drama Borgen on television will remember the high-powered blonde journalist, Katrine Fønsmark, pottering around in her cramped but charming canal-side apartment. Fønsmark and her on-off spin doctor lover, Kasper Juul, take refuge from their frantic lives in their one-person flats - and when they do move in together, it all goes horribly wrong.

Telegraph.co.uk
12/17/2015
Norway launches campaign to give Finland a mountain

A group of Norwegians has launched a campaign to shift their country's border by 200 metres to bring the peak of the Halti mountain into Finnish territory as a gift to their mountain-deprived neighbour for the 100th anniversary of its independence.

Telegraph.co.uk
12/12/2015
Migrant crisis: inside Sweden's first tent city

At the November peak, Sweden was receiving more than 10,000 asylum seekers a week, overwhelming the migration agency to the point that on November 12, it asked Sweden's government to impose border controls. Shortly afterwards, Sweden's governing coalition announced a dramatic tightening of asylum and border rules - a U-turn so painful that Asa Romson, Sweden's deputy prime minister, shed tears as she announced it.

DW.COM
11/18/2015
Sweden hits refugee crisis zero hour | Europe | DW.COM | 20.11.2015

Munir Mohammed, a refugee from Baghdad, opens the flap of the white plastic emergency tent, and points to his nine-year-old daughter Noora, sitting shivering in a toddlers' stroller. "Please tell the Migration Agency we need some warm place," he pleads. "It's cold and my children have problems with breathing.

Telegraph.co.uk
11/14/2015
The week even Sweden said: Enough

"They're worried, of course, just like I was when I first came," said Khaled, 33, a Palestinian Swede and one of the city's few Arabic-speaking policemen. For many Swedes, the return of controls after years of a "Schengen" border-free Europe has been profoundly unsettling.

N for Norwegian
11/01/2015
Meet Turbo Petter

Norway's most rock and roll business tycoon

Telegraph.co.uk
10/28/2015
Sweden conceals refugee centre addresses after attacks

Sweden 's migration authorities on Wednesday moved to hide the locations of buildings earmarked for housing refugees, after attackers set more a dozen prospective refugee centres on fire in a matter of months. Mikael Ribbenvik, chief operative officer at the Swedish Migration Agency, made the decision after the thirteenth centre, a home for unaccompanied refugee children in the city of Lund, was set alight on Monday.

the Guardian
10/10/2015
Revealed: the dark past of 'Outcast', MI6's top wartime double agent

Documents from a secret Swedish archive have identified "Outcast", the double agent judged by MI6 as "one of the most successful spies against Germany that the 1939-45 war produced", as a White Russian émigré previously involved in the most notorious smear in British political history.

Mail Online
The first baby born after a womb transplant turns one

Malin Stenberg was the first woman to have a baby after a womb transplant Her donor for pioneering project was donor was family friend Ewa Rosen, 61 Swedish mother and partner Claes Nilsson initially chose to be anonymous Decided to tell their story when Vincent turned one to give hope to others They look like any other happy family.

The Independent
09/12/2015
Meet three Syrians who have made a new life in the West

Hozaifa Adl Al Mnin could finally relax this week for the first time since he swam from Turkey to the Greek island of Samos in the middle of August. "It was a challenge," the 19-year-old says with a grin, as he describes negotiating the currents of the mile-wide Mycale Strait.

The Independent
09/08/2015
Danish yachtswoman smuggles refugee on her boat to Malmo

Annika Holm Nielsen, a 24-year-old Danish youth politician, sailed her yacht across the five-mile strait from Copenhagen to the Swedish city of Malmo, with a refugee on board, in a trip some have compared to the rescue of Copenhagen's Jews during the Nazi occupation.

The Independent
08/07/2015
Has Sweden's decriminalisation of prostitution worked?

The 29-year-old Polish woman has been selling sex on and off in the country for a decade, but when the police turned up outside the apartment she was renting on Wednesday, arresting the Swedish man inside and grilling her about how she runs her business, it was something new.

the Guardian
09/05/2015
'Narrow-minded' Sweden hails stage version of acclaimed Norwegian novel

When director Ole Anders Tandberg was asked to stage My Struggle for Stockholm's city theatre at the start of this year, his instinct was to refuse. The six-volume autobiographical novel by the Norwegian writer Karl Ove Knausgaard, with its highly personal voice and frequent shifts between memoir and essay, was something no play could do justice to.

Telegraph.co.uk
08/07/2015
Norway's Labour Youth make emotional return to Utoya four years after the massacre

After arriving disguised as a police officer, the anti-Islamist extremist spent an hour and 13 minutes systematically hunting down the 600 delegates, aiming to wipe out the next generation of the Labour Party, which he blamed for developing a multicultural Norway. He shot 56 of his victims in the head at point blank range.

the Guardian
09/13/2014
Free-market era in Sweden swept away as feminists and greens plot new path

For a man who is a near-certainty to become Sweden's prime minister after today's general election, Stefan Löfven has had a miserable campaign. In his latest misstep, Löfven, a burly union leader, was accused last week of "shoving" the female enterprise minister and head of Sweden's Centre party, Annie Lööf, during a televised election debate.

Telegraph.co.uk
06/22/2012
Anders Breivik: I was defending the Norwegian people

Lara Rashid described how moved she had been by the public support at the funeral of her elder sister Bano, who was also killed on the island. "Bano did not die in vain. She died for the multicultural Norway," she said. " The funeral gave me motivation.

the Guardian
08/01/2015
Sweden invents a word for girls' genitals equivalent to 'willy' for boys

I only ever speak English to our three-year-old daughter, and my wife only speaks Swedish to her. The one exception is the word snippa. It's Swedish for a girl's genitals, the female equivalent of snopp, meaning "willy", and I can't find an English word that does the job.

Telegraph.co.uk
06/05/2015
Danish MP calls for tax on use of English words in adverts

"If one uses English in an advert, it should cost a little bit more. We can't ban them from making ads in English but we can make them think twice by hitting them in the wallet," Alex Ahrendtsen, culture spokesman for the far-Right Danish People's Party said in an interview published on Thursday.

The Independent
08/07/2015
Has Sweden's decriminalisation of prostitution worked?

The 29-year-old Polish woman has been selling sex on and off in the country for a decade, but when the police turned up outside the apartment she was renting on Wednesday, arresting the Swedish man inside and grilling her about how she runs her business, it was something new.

Telegraph.co.uk
05/15/2012
Man sets himself on fire outside Anders Behring Breivik trial

"There were police officers on site and the fire was put out quickly," police operations leader Finn Belle said. "The man received burn injuries and was transported to Oslo University Hospital." Despite damage to his stomach and chest, the man was conscious and groaning as he was taken away on a stretcher.

Telegraph.co.uk
06/08/2015
Denmark rehabiliating young drug addicts with year-long Caribbean cruises

How should social services respond to a young hooligan who holds up a convenience store with a carving knife? Denmark has the answer: Send him on a Caribbean cruise for a year. Local councils in the country have spent a combined £4m sending youth criminals and drug abusers on sailing voyages in the Caribbean, according to figures unearthed by Denmark's MetroExpress newspaper.

Telegraph.co.uk
Scan of 'mummified' body of Swedish bishop reveals baby hidden in coffin

In December Peder Winstrup underwent a CT scan at the University hospital in Lund (Lund University) Stillborn infants, or those who died before they could be baptised, were not historically permitted a Christian burial, forcing their bereaved parents into desperate measures.

GlobalPost
06/30/2015
The growing Russia threat is bringing a new Cold War to Nordic countries

COPENHAGEN, Denmark - It took until 10 a.m. on the third day of NATO's annual naval exercise in the Baltic Sea before Sgt. Maj. Lasse Jensen picked up traces of the Russian spy plane he had been expecting. The moment it appeared, he began scrutinizing its movement on his three computer screens at Denmark's radar station on the easterly island of Bornholm.

Telegraph.co.uk
02/11/2014
Scandinavian media flock to 'disarmament' of fermented herring tin

A cabin-owner in Norway has called in a fermented herring expert from Sweden to "disarm" a 25-year-old can of 'surstromming', the odorous Swedish delicacy, which he had become terrified would explode. Inge Hausen, a pensioner from the village of Tyrsil, contacted an explosions expert from the Norwegian army in desperation after finding the can, which had swelled so much that it had lifted his roof by two centimetres.

Telegraph.co.uk
07/22/2012
Wreath-laying opens Utoya Island memorial day

Mr Stoltenberg laid the wreath at 9.30am, alongside Norway's King Harold and Queen Sonja, at the government building, which is still wrapped in white plastic to hide its shattered windows. They will then move on to attend a service at Olso's cathedral.

N for Norwegian
How to say Hit in Norwegian

Forget the rules about creating a Netflix smash. Lilyhammer used a pair of untried producers, a parochial setting and a lot of in-jokes about Norwegian liberalism

Telegraph.co.uk
07/14/2015
Outrage as Anders Breivik items go on display in Norway museum

One of Us: the Story of Anders Breivik and the Massacre in Norway by Åsne Seierstad, review: 'masterful' * Mass murderer Breivik to sue Norway over prison conditions "Knowledge is our most important weapon in the fight against violence, hatred and extremism," Norway's minister of Local Government Jan Tore Sanner told Norway's Aftenposten newspaper.

Telegraph.co.uk
08/27/2015
Britain will be forced to take 'fair share' of refugees, Swedish minister warns

Mapped: Where do migrants apply for asylum in Europe? Mr Johansson was critical of Britain's insistence in May that it would exercise its opt-out from EU justice and home affairs legislation to avoid participating in a binding, compulsory system. "When the UK is not doing their share, that creates bigger problems for the rest of us," he said.

the Guardian
09/15/2014
Sweden's Social Democrats face weak minority government

Sweden's Social Democratic party, which on Sunday ended its longest spell in opposition in a century, faces a weak minority government after the far-right Sweden Democrats emerged as the third-largest party. In his first speech after the election result, the incoming prime minister, Stefan Löfven, a former welder who built his career in the country's union movement, expressed his conviction thatinsisted the new government would be functional.

Telegraph.co.uk
05/21/2012
Anders Behring Breivik survivor brings court to tears

Hanne Hesto Ness endured more than 15 operations over a period of nearly four months before she could rise from her wheelchair. The morphine she received made her distant, but did not remove the terrible pain.

Telegraph.co.uk
08/22/2015
Child hero of Afghan film 'The Kite Runner' finds new home in Sweden

But far from bringing him fame and fortune in his native land, his acclaimed performance - for which he earned just $15,000 - has forced him into exile. During the shooting of the film, Ahmad claims that producers agreed to delete a scene in which the character he plays is sexually assaulted by an elder boy.

Telegraph.co.uk
Swedish man 'was not trapped in his car'

"It wasn't snowed in. Not the right passenger door," said Andreas Gidlund, one of the two traffic policemen who pulled Mr Skyllberg's emaciated body from the vehicle. "If you look at the back door, on the left side, it was very compacted snow - but on the right side, it was very loose snow.

Telegraph.co.uk
05/16/2012
Anders Behring Breivik victim wrote parents' phone number in his own blood

Glenn Waldenstrom, 20, was one of five witnesses who on Wednesday described how the Norwegian mass killer opened fire in the café where they were hiding, killing 13 people. "I could not talk, so I spat some blood on the floor and wrote my family's telephone number in the blood," he said of what happened after Breivik left the building.

the Guardian
05/04/2015
Sweden urged to rethink parents' choice over schools after education decline

Sweden has been urged to halt the steep decline in the international ranking of its schools by taking action to limit parents' and pupils' right to choose. A report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) recommends "a comprehensive education reform" to restore the Swedish system to its previous standards.

the Guardian
08/23/2014
Sweden's Strictly star adds charisma to feminist push for parliament

The minute her talk is over, Gudrun Schyman, leader of Sweden's Feminist Initiative party, is mobbed on the roof terrace by a crowd running the gamut of leftwing fashion, from dreadlocks, undercuts and stretched ears to 50s-style clothes and beehive hairdos. Some buy Schyman's book; others seem mainly to want a photograph with her to put on Facebook.

the Guardian
06/24/2014
World Cup adopted teams: who's following who around the world

As the World Cup approaches the knockout stages, spare a thought for those whose team was not even in Brazil. Billions of people around the world have had to adopt countries to follow. Sometimes the affiliation is predictable, sometimes it is surprising. Who knew the Chinese had quietly adopted Germany?

the Guardian
11/18/2012
All dads together: my new life among Sweden's latte pappas

It's around 6pm at the end of my third week of paternity leave - or pappaledigt, as it is known in Sweden - and since 5.30pm I've checked the kitchen clock every five minutes. My daughter Eira is crying and I can't work out what she wants.

the Guardian
04/28/2015
Swedish council becomes first to limit private profits in healthcare

Härnösand, a sleepy regional capital 400km north of Stockholm, could go down as where the counter-revolution began. This month, the regional council ordered its officials to find ways to limit the profits private companies can reap from running publicly-funded health services.

Telegraph.co.uk
06/05/2015
Nato boss praises Angela Merkel's wine-drinking stamina

Mr Stoltenberg, who served as Norway 's Prime Minister from 2005 until 2013, told the two interviewers that the German chancellor and himself had developed a strong personal relationship during long and gruelling negotiations over climate change, pointing in particular to "those long nights in Copenhagen in 2009".

Telegraph.co.uk
06/02/2015
Cameron to gain ally as Danish eurosceptics pledge to back EU talks

"And the thing is that it will cost [Liberal Party candidate] Lars Loekke Rasmussen nothing in internal politics to support the UK, because his own electorate is quite eurosceptic as well." David Cameron cancelled his planned visit to Denmark last week after Helle Thorning-Schmidt, the incumbent Danish prime minister, announced a snap election.

the Guardian
11/16/2014
Across Europe disillusioned voters turn to outsiders for solutions

To make their point that France's mainstream parties are both as inept as each other, the Front National has taken to calling its rivals the UMPS, an amalgam of the acronyms for the opposition centre-right Union pour un Mouvement Populaire and the ruling Parti Socialiste.

the Guardian
02/09/2014
Better childcare? Only if British dads and employers mend their ways

For the umpteenth time, I drag my two-year old daughter up the pulkabacka, or sledge hill, a mound in my local park which is entirely ignored apart from on the few days it snows, when it becomes a mass of whizzing toddlers. It's just after 3pm on a Wednesday, and the hill is already crowded.

Telegraph.co.uk
04/13/2012
Anders Behring Breivik to claim he killed 77 people 'in self-defence'

"My point in saying that was to prepare people, so that we will be more ready for what will come at the trial," he told Dagbladet. "I think we're going to hear many very provocative statements from him." A panel of two judges and three magistrates are to rule on Breivik's case after a trial scheduled to last 10 weeks.

the Guardian
06/02/2015
Bornholm reborn: Denmark's cycling holiday paradise

Bornholm used to be a bucket-and-spade place, where almost everyone in Denmark decamped to in the summer; the rich to their summerhouses and the elegant "Badehotels" on the north coast, everyone else to the caravan parks and sandy beaches of the south.

Telegraph.co.uk
05/27/2015
Al Pacino pulls out of 'Nazi' Danish play

The American actor Al Pacino has pulled out of a stage adaptation of Hunger, the dark psychological novel by Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun, because of the writer's enthusiastic support for Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany.

The Independent
05/23/2015
Denmark keeps Russia on its radar as Putin's aggression heightens tension between nations

"The man who shot at us was up there." The 76-year-old former engineer points to a ridge a few metres from the perimeter fence of the island's tiny airport. "That was the entrance to the camp, and on the other side there was a small shop where my father worked, and that's where one of the Russians got mad and pulled out his pistol."

Telegraph.co.uk
09/08/2013
Norway poised to reject Labour party just two years after Utoya massacre

"That removed to a large extent the positive reactions that he received after July 22, 2011," said Bernt Aardal, professor of politics at the University of Oslo. Immediately after the attacks, support for Labour rose to 40.5 per cent, giving the party a commanding lead over the Conservatives on 22 per cent, according to one poll.

the Guardian
07/18/2015
The ghostwriter, the secret plot and a 'grave-robbing' Stieg Larsson sequel

"I was just talking to a Russian colleague about the cover," says Linda Altrov Berg, a little breathlessly, when she eventually comes on the line. Altrov Berg, the head of rights for Swedish publisher Norstedts, is wrapping up preparations for next month's launch of The Girl in the Spider's Web, the continuation of Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy.

Telegraph.co.uk
Eurosceptic Danish People's Party surge in general election

"It is completely unreal," said Kristian Thulesen Dahl, the Danish People's Party (DPP) leader, as he congratulated his party, but he gave no hints even on whether his party wanted to join a ruling Right-wing coalition let alone lead it.

Telegraph.co.uk
04/04/2014
Swedish stroke patient hears doctors discuss removing his organs

By that time, he was completely paralysed. "They looked at an x-ray of my brain, and when they had done that, they told my girlfriend that it wasn't good and that I wouldn't live," Mr Fritze said. "I could hear her crying the whole time, but I couldn't do anything."

the Guardian
11/11/2014
Teenager who claims to have fled North Korea faces deportation from Sweden

A teenager who claims to have escaped from North Korea is facing deportation from Sweden - in part because authorities misspelled the names of places he mentioned in his asylum interviews. The Swedish migration board wants to send the 17-year-old to China, where it believes he is from, after ruling last year that there was not enough evidence that he is North Korean.

the Guardian
03/27/2014
Food waste around the world

Jeong Ho-jin dons a pair of plastic gloves to show off his most proud achievement as a district official in Seoul, and then uses his keys to unlock a large, rectangular contraption that looks like some kind of futuristic top-loading washing machine.

Telegraph.co.uk
05/23/2014
Artist boils and eats own hip

A Norwegian conceptual artist has described how he boiled up his own hip bone, stripped off the flesh, and then ate it with some potato gratin and a glass of wine. Alexander Selvik Wengshoel, 25, told Norway's Nordlys newspaper that hospital doctors had allowed him to film the hip replacement operation he underwent aged 21, after which he had taken the bone home as an artistic souvenir.

the Guardian
04/12/2014
Mira Grosin interview: school, football... and a movie on the side

Moments after Mira Grosin arrives, four of her schoolfriends requisition the table next to us, kicking back their chairs and studying the junk shop decor in an exaggerated display of inconspicuousness. "Oh my God, they're stalkers to me," she moans, throwing out her arm to block them from view.

the Guardian
11/13/2011
Far-right Finnish politician Timo Soini bids for presidency

Timo Soini is excited about Italian bond yields. "I just heard that the interest on Italian 10-year loans is now over 7.3%," he whispers as a cast-iron lift hoists us from the ground floor of the monumental Finnish parliament to his office above. "This is a horrendous situation."

the Guardian
05/31/2013
Swedish free school operator to close, leaving hundreds of pupils stranded

Britain's adoption of Sweden's "free school" model has been called into question after one of Sweden's largest private sector school operators announced it would shut down, leaving hundreds of students stranded. JB Education, whose schools educate around 10,000 Swedish pupils, said on Thursday that it would sell 19 of its high schools and close down the remaining four.

the Guardian
01/01/2012
Strange case of a fake Ibsen play that has gripped Scandinavia

It's the case that has absorbed Scandinavia's elite artistic circles and tested some of Norway's finest literary experts. Over the next few months, investigators from the Norwegian police's economic crimes unit will be combing the market for supposed possessions and letters relating to the playwright Henrik Ibsen, and the Nobel-winning novelist - and Nazi sympathiser - Knut Hamsun as part of investigations into an alleged scam that exploited the nation's interest in its most celebrated authors.

the Guardian
02/13/2014
Denmark's robotic helpers transform care for older people

Anja Vestergaard brings out the robot and I come foot-to-wheel with the contraption that is supposedly revolutionising Denmark's care for the elderly. It's a little disappointing. It's just one of those automated disc vacuum cleaners that scoots around the floor, with sensors to avoid walls and a system to prevent it going over the same ground twice.

the Guardian
01/29/2014
Henning Mankell, Wallander author, reveals cancer

The bestselling Swedish crime writer Henning Mankell has revealed that he has cancer, and that he plans to chronicle his battle with the disease in a newspaper column.The 65-year-old writer, known for his popular Kurt Wallander detective novels, delivered the news in a short but moving article in Sweden's Göteborgs-Posten newspaper."My anxiety is very profound, although by and large, I can keep it under control," he wrote.

the Guardian
04/20/2013
Doubts over childcare 'expert' feted by Tories

A Swedish childcare "expert" who was called to brief MPs last month on the dangers of subsidised daycare has been attacked as "unscientific" and "unqualified" by the author of the main study on which he drew.

the Guardian
12/10/2013
Sweden proposes ban on fees for national boarding schools

Sweden's government has proposed barring its prestigious national boarding schools from charging parents additional fees for their children's education, turning them instead into ordinary government-funded free schools. "It's hard to defend the fact that a few select schools should operate under completely different terms from all the rest," Jan Björklund, the country's education minister, told Sweden's state radio as he announced the policy on Tuesday morning.

the Guardian
11/11/2013
Sweden closes four prisons as number of inmates plummets

Sweden has experienced such a sharp fall in the number of prison admissions in the past two years that it has decided to close down four prisons and a remand centre. "We have seen an out-of-the-ordinary decline in the number of inmates," said Nils Öberg, the head of Sweden's prison and probation services.

the Guardian
01/17/2012
Free-school licence advertised on Swedish 'eBay'

A permit to run one of Sweden's free schools - which inspired the flagship Tory policy of letting parents and teachers set up their own schools in Britain - has been advertised on the country's equivalent of eBay.