Sweden and Finland to attend Madrid Nato summit

Sweden and Finland, which have applied to join Nato, will attend the transatlantic alliance’s summit in Madrid next month, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said on Tuesday.

“Of course,” Sanchez replied, when asked at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, if the two nations would send delegations to the June 28-30 gathering.

“They are big democracies, very well established and consolidated democracies, and I think it is also very important for Nato and the European Union to have them on board as Nato allies,” he added.

Spain will speed up its parliamentary procedure to give its backing for the entry of the two nations in the alliance, the prime minister said.

Swedish Vocab: Natos toppmöte – Nato’s summit

Football fans auction Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s nose on eBay

Anonymous football fans are auctioning three copies of Zlatan’s amputated nose on auction site eBay, stating on their website, vararnasan.se (“where is the nose.se”) that the aim of the initiative is to “draw attention to the problems in Swedish and international football”. Read our explainer here. 

Swedish Vocab: en avgjutning – a cast

Court to rule on brothers who went to join Islamic State

A court in Gothenburg is to rule today on two brothers who travelled Syria to fight for the Islamic State (IS) terror group. The two men, both in their 40s, were arrested in February at Gothenburg’s Landvetter Airport. 

Chat material is being used to try and prove that the two men wanted to join IS and work for the terror group. If they are found guilty, they will be the first to be jailed under Sweden’s resandebrott, or travel crime law. 

Swedish vocab: resandebrott – travel crime 

Sweden proposes new laws to push foreign-born women into jobs

Sweden’s government has launched an investigation into measures that could push foreign-born women into the labour market. 

Among other measures, the government wants to change the so-called “introduction benefit”, or etableringsersättning, that people newly arrived in Sweden receive while they are looking for work. At present, this is given to each household, but the government now wants to divide it between each parent so that women have an incentive to look for work on arrival in Sweden. 

“We should not have incentives which lock women in the home and cement old gender roles,” said employment minister Eva Nordmark at a press conference. 

The government will also create an “activity duty” for those on benefits, and bring in more family planning measures to prevent women having children that the parents are not able to support without benefits.   

Swedish vocab: att försörja – to support