Wave of violence sweeping across Nordic countries stuns Western observers

January 5, 2012 – SWEDEN – Police are baffled after a wave of shootings has swept across Sweden’s third-largest city, raising concerns that Malmo has become a magnet for gang-related killings. On Thursday dozens of police took to the streets of Malmo to try calm the public and to collect tips about the attacks, which come only a year after a suspected serial shooter was arrested in the city in southern Sweden. In less than six weeks, five people have been shot dead in this city of 250,000, including a 15-year-old boy. Police spokesman Lars-Hakan Lindholm says “it’s exceptional that there have been so many murders in such a short period of time” and that both the motives for the slayings and the perpetrators remain unknown. On Friday, demonstrators in Malmo will protest organized crime. The recent wave of violence that has swept over Nordic countries has stunned Western observers who are accustomed to seeing tranquility among people of the north Arctic region. In the summer of 2011, Anders Behring Breivik shocked and horrified the world when he ruthlessly shot and killed 77 people in Norway. Perhaps the explosion of violence is one more indication that societies’ civility is in a rapid state of decline as appears to be the case across the rest of the planet. –Yahoo News added