Swedish premier threatens to step down if no-confidence vote against justice minister succeeds

By Atila Altuntas

STOCKHOLM (AA) - Sweden's Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson announced Thursday that she would step down if a vote of no-confidence succeeds against the justice minister.

Right-wing parties in parliament recently submitted a no-confidence motion against Justice and Interior Minister Morgan Johansson over his handling of gang crime.

Saying that the government and herself are focused entirely on societal issues, Andersson said there is a huge problem with increasing violence in Sweden.

She said it was "horrifically irresponsible" to single out a minister over Sweden’s problems with gun crime and violent gangs.

“We are right now three months before a general election, and there’s a war in our neighborhood.

"To then create a situation of political chaos and insecurity is totally irresponsible," she added.

"If you think that this problem is simply about a justice minister, then you haven’t understood the problem at all...The problem is much bigger than that."

According to data from the Swedish police, 45 people died on average in the country annually in the last five years as a result of clashes due to criminal gangs while 31 people were killed as a result of armed attacks in the first five months of this year.

Meanwhile, Amineh Kakabaveh, a Kurdish lawmaker of Iranian origin in Sweden’s parliament and supporter of the YPG/PKK terrorist organization, told the government not to agree to Türkiye’s conditions for Sweden’s membership bid in NATO in a statement given to state-controlled television broadcaster SVT.

Telling the government to stick to the agreement in support of the YPG/PKK, Kakabaveh claimed that otherwise she would cut her support for the government.