Sweden raises threat level, citing “concrete information”

Swedish authorities have said that they are hunting a suspect and had “concrete information” of a possible attack only days after ISIS terrorists killed more than a hundred people across Paris in a series of coordinated attacks.

An arrest warrant has been issued for the suspect, whose identity has not been revealed, the head of domestic intelligence and counter-terrorism Anders Thornberg told a press conference in Stockholm.

As a result of the new specific intelligence and against the background of the threat posed to European countries by Islamic State, Sweden raised its rating on the threat to the country Wednesday to four, or “high”, from three, or “elevated”.

Sweden also raised its threat level several hours after Denmark, to “high”, also the second-highest level.

“Certain individuals could possibly become inspired to carry out attacks”.

Gefle Dagblad, a newspaper in eastern Sweden which published a series of investigative articles about militant Islamism and received a bomb threat in September, was among newspapers to which police had deployed patrols, its publisher told Reuters.

Meanwhile, police in neighbouring Norway have also been advised to be on the lookout for the suspect, news agency NTB reported.

Police raised their presence at public and strategic locations around the country as the alert went out, including sites such as government buildings, foreign embassies and a few media outlets.

Prosecutors have opened a preliminary investigation into a possible terrorist offence.

It was not clear whether the attack was planned to be carried out in Sweden.

While neutral, Sweden has participated in North Atlantic Treaty Organisation missions in Afghanistan and is now training Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga battling IS in northern Iraq. And there are parts of Swedish society who don’t consider that jihadism is a problem here.