16-year-old arrested after three dead in Sweden shooting

Swedish police have arrested a teen suspect after three youths aged from 15 to 20 were killed in a shooting at a hair salon, authorities said on Wednesday. The attack comes amid rising concern over gang violence in the Scandinavian nation.

Tuesday's shooting took place in broad daylight a day before the Valborg spring festival in the university city of Uppsala, which draws more than 100,000 people for bonfires and celebrations, many of them students.

"One person has been arrested suspected of murder," police commander Erik Akerlund told reporters Wednesday, with prosecutors saying the suspect was 16.

Swedish media reported that at least one of the dead had connections to a crime gang, although police would not confirm those reports.

"That is something we are obviously looking into, but we don't want to commit ourselves to only that" possibility, Uppsala police spokesman Stefan Larsson said.

Uppsala is home base for Sweden's two most notorious gang leaders, Ismael Abdo and Rawa Majid, who are both believed to be orchestrating operations from abroad. 

The Scandinavian country has struggled for years to rein in shootings and bombings between rival gangs.

Akerlund said several people "considered of interest in the investigation" had been brought in for questioning.

He said police had obtained camera footage from the scene and "secured a lot of evidence".

Justice Minister Gunnar Strommer has called the killings "extremely serious", while Uppsala's mayor Erik Pelling told AFP he was "shocked and dismayed" by events.

"I am also angry that it could happen," he added.

"We are forced to live with these crimes. I am frustrated that we have not been able to tackle this problem more effectively," Pelling said.

Youth gang violence

Sweden has struggled for years to rein in gang shootings and bombings.

On Sunday, a mother and her young child were severely injured when a homemade bomb tore through their home, media reported, adding that a neighbor suspected of ties to criminal gangs had been the real target.

Earlier this month, two people were killed in a suspected gang fight in Gothenburg, while a renowned rapper was shot dead in a gang battle in the city last year.

Perpetrators are often young teens hired as contract killers because they are under 15, the age of criminal responsibility in Sweden. 

The number of reported gang deaths fell last year, however.

In the country of 10.6 million people, 92 killings were recorded in 2024, 29 fewer than 2023 - the lowest level since 2014, according to official data.

There were also 296 reported shootings, down a fifth on the year before, according to the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention (Bra).

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson's centre-right minority government, which is backed in parliament by the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats, came to power in 2022 with a vow to get tough on crime.

Sweden was also rocked by its worst mass shooting in February when 35-year-old Rickard Andersson entered the Campus Risbergska adult education centre in the city of Orebro and shot dead 10 people before turning the gun on himself.