Far-right leader who burned copies of Qur’an goes on trial in Sweden

A far-right Danish-Swedish politician who burned copies of the Qur’an in Sweden has gone on trial charged with incitement against an ethnic group.

Rasmus Paludan, the leader of the Danish political party Stram Kurs (Hard Line), is the first person to go on trial in Sweden in relation to Qur’an burnings.

He refused to attend Malmö district court as proceedings began on Monday, saying his life would be in danger if he went to the southern Swedish city. Instead, he appeared by video link from an undisclosed location in Sweden.

Paludan, 42, is charged with two counts of incitement against an ethnic group and one count of insult in relation to gatherings held in Sweden in 2022.

In April of that year, Paludan held a public meeting that was followed by riots in Swedish cities including Malmö, Landskrona, Linköping and Örebro during the Easter weekend. At the meeting he made several statements that the prosecutor alleges were incitement against an ethnic group.

At another meeting, in September 2022, Paludan is accused of racially motivated verbal attacks on “Arabs and Africans”. For this he is charged with insult, a crime that under Swedish law is punishable by a fine or imprisonment for up to six months. Paludan denies all the charges.

Taking the stand remotely, Paludan said: “I am a critic of Islam and criticise Islam. Not Muslims.” He added: “I want to criticise ideas not people.”

In the summer of 2023 a string of Qur’an burning protests in Sweden, including outside parliament, prompted domestic debate over Sweden’s exceptionally liberal freedom of expression laws. It also led to a diplomatic row between Sweden and Muslim countries.

Paludan’s burning of the Qur’an outside the Turkish embassy in Stockholm in January 2023 is widely thought to have slowed Sweden’s passage to Nato membership.

Vilhelm Persson, a law professor at Lund University, said Paludan’s trial had “a fundamental significance” in that it was the first case to be tried in connection to burning of the Qur’an. But he said the fact that the trial was being heard in a district court meant it had limitations. In order for it to set legal precedent, it would need to be heard in the Swedish supreme court.

The prosecutor’s office said on Monday: “Today, October 14, the main hearing starts in Malmö district court in the case where a 42-year-old man has been charged with two counts of incitement against an ethnic group and an insult. The events took place in April and September 2022 in Malmö.”

The senior prosecutor Adrien Combier-Hogg said in August: “My assessment is that there are sufficient reasons to bring charges and now the district court will hear the case.”