Swedish police arrest man over truck
attack which killed four
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[April 08, 2017]
By Johan Ahlander, Johannes Hellstrom and Niklas Pollard
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - Swedish police have
arrested a man they suspect drove a beer delivery truck which rammed
into a crowd in central Stockholm on Friday, killing four people and
wounding 15 in what they described as a terror crime.
Police declined to comment on the identity or possible motive of the
man, who they detained in a northern Stockholm suburb but Swedish public
radio, citing unnamed sources, said he was from Uzbekistan.
(For graphic on map locating scene of attack click here:
http://tmsnrt.rs/2pd1g3F)
"The person in question has been arrested as the culprit ... in this
case the driver," police spokesman Lars Bystrom said on Saturday of the
attack, adding that the authorities were not ruling out the possibility
that he had accomplices, although only one person had been taken into
custody.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Friday's attack, in
which a hijacked truck was used, and police said security at Sweden's
borders had been heightened and traffic was restricted on the Oresund
Bridge linking Denmark and Sweden.
Vehicles have been used as weapons in Nice, Berlin and London in the
past year in attacks claimed by Islamic State.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2017/Apr/08/images/ads/current/napa_bch1-3108.png)
Police declined to comment on a report by public broadcaster SVT which
said a bag containing a home-made bomb had been found in the truck. The
report said the bomb may have partly exploded, burning the driver.
The beer truck, hijacked on Drottninggatan (Queen Street) in central
Stockholm, ploughed through crowds before ramming into the Ahlens
department store. The driver escaped in the chaos.
Local authorities in the capital, where flags flew at half mast on
buildings including the parliament and royal palace, said that six of
those injured had been able to leave hospital, while eight adults and
one child remained in hospital.
The truck was removed overnight to be examined by forensics experts,
leaving a gaping hole in the wall of the store. Dozens of people
gathered at the site to pay their respects.
"Three minutes of terror and death," was the headline in daily tabloid
newspaper Aftonbladet which carried a picture of an injured woman
sitting in the street.
On Saturday morning, in a nearby open-air market, owners were returning
to abandoned fruit and vegetable stalls after a defiant message from the
country's prime minister.
"You will not defeat us, you will not govern our lives, you will never,
ever win," Stefan Lofven, who described the assault as a terrorist
attack, said late on Friday.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2016/Aug/26/images/ads/current/ldn_medical_directory_small_2016.png)
HIGH ALERT
The attack was the latest to hit the Nordic region after shootings in
Danish capital Copenhagen in 2015 that killed three people and the 2011
bombing and shooting by far-right extremist Anders Behring Breivik that
killed 77 people in Norway.
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![](../images/040817pics/news_p23.jpg)
Police in central Stockholm near the crime scene on April 08, 2017,
the day after a hijacked beer truck plowed into pedestrians on
Drottninggatan and crashed into Ahlens department store on Friday,
killing four people, injuring 15 others. TT News Agency/Anders
Wiklund/via REUTERS
![](../images/ads/current/richardson_lda_090916.png)
Although Sweden has not seen a large-scale attack, a failed suicide
bombing in December 2010 killed the attacker only a few hundred
yards from the site of Friday's incident.
Police in Norway's largest cities and at Oslo airport will carry
weapons until further notice following the attack. Denmark has been
on high alert since the February 2015 shootings.
Several attacks in which trucks or cars have driven into crowds have
taken place in Europe in the past year.
Al Qaeda urged its followers to use trucks as a weapon in 2010 and
Islamic State claimed responsibility for an attack in Nice, France,
in July 2016, when a truck killed 86 people celebrating Bastille
Day, and one in Berlin in December, when a truck smashed through a
Christmas market, killing 12 people.
And last month, a man in London drove into pedestrians near
Britain's parliament and then stabbed a policeman to death before
being killed himself. Six people died in total.
"Our thoughts are going out to those that were affected, and to
their families," Sweden's King Carl Gustaf said regarding the
Stockholm attack, while European Union President Jean-Claude Juncker
said an attack on any member state "is an attack on us all".
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2017/Apr/08/images/ads/current/xamis_lda_SFARM_2017.png)
In February U.S. President Donald Trump falsely suggested there had
been an immigration-related security incident in Sweden, to the
bafflement of Swedes.
Neutral Sweden has not fought a war in more than 200 years, but its
military has taken part in U.N. peacekeeping missions in a number of
conflict zones in recent years, including Iraq, Mali and
Afghanistan.
(Reporting by Stockholm newsroom; editing by Alexander Smith)
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