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Syria warns Swedes: don't join rebels

Published: 25 Dec 12 11:26 CET | Print version
Online: http://www.thelocal.se/45264/20121225/

Syria News, a regime-run television station, has warned Swedes against fighting in the Syrian civil war, reports Sweden's TV4 News.

The Syria News clip warns that Swedish "mercenaries" will meet a "fate darker than the night" and will be "crushed on Syria's noble ground".

The statement is seen as a response to a recruitment video that appeared on YouTube in November 2012.

The video encouraged Swedish Muslims to join the fight against the Syrian regime.

It was posted on YouTube by a group calling itself the Swedish holy warriors in Syria (Svenska Mujahideen Fi Ash Sham). The group also emailed a link to the video to the TT news agency.

"Jihad is obligatory for any and all who believe in Allah, his prophet and doomsday. It is obligatory in Sweden and in the rest of the world," a man speaking in fluent but slightly accented Swedish says in the clip.

Swedish security service Säpo confirmed that Swedes have travelled to Syria to fight in the civil war but did not say how many have gone.

The YouTube video shows several persons holding automatic weapons and assembling outdoors. The landscape appears to be Mediterranean.

However, experts at Säpo were unable to confirm whether the video was recorded in Syria.

It was also unclear why the group chose to use an older Arabic name for Syria - Sham.

Nor is there information on whether the men in the video have any ties to larger militant networks or have acted alone in producing the amateur clip.

Experts also questioned the extent of the Swedish connections of those behind the video.

"You see one person who speaks Swedish, so it's hard to say anything about how many who are behind the film have ties to Sweden," terror expert Lars Nicander of the Swedish National Defence College told the Expressen newspaper at the time.

This is not the first time that Swedes have been called to arms by groups claiming it is a religious obligation.

”(Somali Islamists) al-Shabaab did something similar two years ago and filmed it in the sports arena in Mogadishu,” said Nicander.

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11:42 December 25, 2012 by fmb
they should at least be forbidden from returning to Sweden, if they go to war
12:26 December 25, 2012 by johan rebel
They are warning "Swedes"? The Syrian goverment must have adopted the same funny definition of Swedes an the media have in this country.

No proper Swede in his right mind would go fight in Syria.
13:12 December 25, 2012 by fareasttiger
How about this huh...? The Islamic Kingdom of Sweden? Or The Islamic Republic of Sweden? They both sound just right don't they? It looks like the wild weeds are going to eat over the delicate indoor flowers very soon, one way or the other...

It's not sweden, but also entire western europe is effing PATHETIC! They are not raising people anymore, they're raising sheeple, atleast most of them anyway.
19:24 December 25, 2012 by Gardian
@ Fareasttiger. What about your HUH..? I am afraid that SD bats came here to play their sick ideologue about Sweden. these idiots don't understand the context in which some of this groups are there in their homeland to take part in revolution movement that all western power are part of it including Sweden Uk USA Syrian regime. there is some information that Säpo and other security agencies are supporting the Syrian rebels, who knows maybe these folks are part of that.

Again what is real is The government knows what is going on and it has nothing to do with Muslims in Sweden.
22:46 December 25, 2012 by fareasttiger
How about this huh...? The Islamic Kingdom of Sweden? Or The Islamic Republic of Sweden? They both sound just right don't they? It looks like the wild weeds are going to eat over the delicate indoor flowers very soon, one way or the other...

It's not only sweden, but also entire western europe is effing WEAK and PATHETIC! They are not raising people anymore, they're raising sheeple, atleast most of them anyway.

Hey SD, may be it's time for you to learn a thing or two from your brothers and sisters the Golden Dawn of Greece...take a few chapters from them, for they have been very effective in dealing with the sheeple and the lawlessness...
02:45 December 31, 2012 by bezjaj
To call for fighting a Jihad war in Syria and then come back to Sweden? It's a CRIME you idiots ..This leftist BS has to end before our own kids will damn us for leaving them to defend democracy..
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