Sweden’s juvenile gang crime wave will take a decade to fix, senior minister says

Reversing a rise of gang violence involving children in Sweden will take at least a decade, the Nordic nation’s justice minister said Tuesday.

“The problems are certainly very serious, and it will take time to persistently reverse the trend, not the least regarding children,” Swedish Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer told the Financial Times.

The country has been rocked by a wave of gang violence in recent years, with its gun crime rate now among the highest in the EU. Sixty-two people were shot dead in 2022, a record figure, and 54 in 2023.

Ensuring children growing up in Sweden today don’t fall into a life of crime would take at least a decade. “That is a very realistic view on the time perspective,” Strömmer said.

Gang crime and migration have become hot button issues in Sweden, propelling the far right to electoral success.

Much of the bloodshed is perpetrated by internationally linked gangs who recruit children into their ranks. Last September, after a 25-year-old woman was killed in a gangland bombing, Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson vowed in a rare televised address to “hunt down the gangs.”

Earlier this year, the Swedish parliament authorized the police to set up so-called security zones, allowing them to carry out searches in certain areas without a warrant or probable cause. Strömmer said the government was also toughening sentences for youth offenders.

“There’s a constant risk of spirals of new violence bubbling under the surface,” he said.