Stockholm Attack: Bomb Blasts Shake Swedish Capital (Video)

One dead in suspected suicide terrorist bombing

 

[ Police Say Sweden Blasts Were Terror Crimes -

STOCKHOLM—Two bomb blasts shook downtown Stockholm on Saturday afternoon, injuring two and killing one, in what has been described as a terrorist suicide bombing, the Swedish security police agency SÄPO has said.

Around 5 p.m. local time on December 11, SÄPO and Swedish news agency TT received violent threats in the form of emails and sound files. Ten minutes later, a white Audi exploded in the very heart of Stockholm's shopping district, where Christmas shopping was in full swing.

Only a few minutes later and a couple of blocks away, a man that SÄPO has since called a "terrorist" set off a bomb strapped to his own body, killing himself, but injuring no one else.

Two people received minor injuries in the first attack.

The bomber, Iraqi-born Taimour Abdulwahab al-Abdaly, said in his threats to TT and SÄPO that he was targeting Swedish civilians because of Sweden's participation in the war in Afghanistan as well as the country's non-response to the Muhammad cartoons drawn by a Swedish artist that caused widespread protests in the Muslim world.

SÄPO said after the bombings that their assessment of the threat level against Sweden remains unchanged, but the agency is currently reviewing the issue.

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Stockholm attack: A man points at the corner of Olof Palmes Gata and Drottninggatan streets in central Stockholm, where an apparent car bomb exploded on December 11. (JONATHAN NACKSTRAND/AFP/Getty Images)

Magnus Ranstorp, terrorism expert at the Swedish National Defence College told TV channel TV4 that he finds it hard to believe that this was the work of a single individual, considering the difficulty of the operation.

“A car bomb was set off and a man was strapped with pipe bombs in a separate operation. Several threatening messages were delivered to the Swedish public. I do not believe the planning and execution of all this is the act of a single individual," he told the news channel.

Six connected pipe bombs were found on al-Abdaly, but only one was actually set off.
"If it had gone off on Drottninggatan [the main shopping street in Stockholm] it would have been a massacre," a source told Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet.

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt commented on the incident on Twitter, calling it “a very worrying attempt at a terrorist attack in a heavily populated part of downtown Stockholm."

"Failed," Bildt tweeted, referring to the attack, "but the consequences could have been catastrophic.”

At a press conference on Sunday, Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt stressed the importance of taking a stand for democracy and giving the justice system time to conduct a thorough investigation before jumping to conclusions.

“Let us not act based on speculation,” he said.

If the bombings were indeed a terrorist act, the attack would be the first of its kind in Sweden.