APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200090019-6
F. Maintenance of internal security (S)
1. Police
The maintenance of law and order is facilitated by the relative stability of social and economic conditions. The police are honest and efficient. Although subject to fairly frequent evaluations and criticism by the public and the news media, they enjoy a greater measure of respect than do their colleagues in almost any other Western European country outside of Scandinavia.
Traditionally more decentralized than elsewhere in Europe, the police system, because of "increasing problems attending the maintenance of public order in a complex, modern, industrialized nation," was fully nationalized only in 1965. Centralized coordination was required because of the growing geographic mobility and acute problems of road traffic control (Sweden ranked third among the nations of the world in per capita automobile ownership, with 28 automobiles per 100 population in 1969) and the complexities inherent in modern crowd control and crime detection and prevention. The openness of the government process, as well as some built-in restraints at both the national and the local levels, assures protection from possible police abuse.
At the national level a command group plans and coordinates all police efforts. The National Police Board, consisting of the Chief of the National Police, his deputy, and six lay members appointed by the King-in-Council, heads the command group. All policy decisions must be approved by the board, and the activities of the command group are under the constant scrutiny of the Minister of Justice. By constitutional law all domestic official plans and documents, except the few that may be classified "secret" for limited, specific reasons, are public property and are available to the press. Local police chiefs are directly accountable to the national authority and in administrative matters to the provincial governor.
Under the Chief of the National Police are three special assistants or chiefs, each heading a specific department. Police Bureau I of Department A has nationwide responsibility for the planning and coordination of surveillance activities and the protection of life and property. Specifically, it has jurisdiction over vehicular traffic, civil armed guards, patrol activities, alien control, and social police work. Contingency planning for utilization of the entire police force, the armed forces, and the civil defense establishment in the event of war is coordinated through this bureau. Police Bureau II has national jurisdiction over the criminal police, including those concerned with both the suppression and detection of crime. The National Homicide Commission, under the jurisdiction of this bureau, coordinates and supervises countrywide investigative procedures in instances of difficult murder cases and serious violent crimes. The bureau also maintains contact with INTERPOL. The two bureaus of Department B are responsible for technology and training, and Department C is concerned with administrative and legal matters.
In keeping with the gradual centralization of the police, an amalgamation of local police authority has developed since the early postwar years, when there were 700 semiautonomous police districts. By 1962 the number of districts had been reduced to 562, with a total of 909 police stations. In 1970, Sweden had reduced administration to 119 police districts, with just over 500 police stations. Each of the districts is headed by a chief constable.
Police chiefs in the provinces and Stockholm coordinate all protection, surveillance, and criminal work among the districts under their jurisdiction. Additionally, both men and horses of the special mounted police divisions for riot and general crowd control stationed in Stockholm, Goteborg, and Malmo may be transported rapidly to any place of potential need. An exception to the general pattern of enhanced public security has been the demonstrations since the latter 1960s by both resident foreigners and Swedish nationals against certain foreign embassies in Stockholm. The Swedish Government has responded by contracting with a private organization to furnish guards, equipped with radios, at important intersections throughout embassy row. Their job is to radio for regular police in the event of a spontaneous demonstration or attack.
Another relatively serious disruption of public order occurred in 1970, when dissident youths in Stockholm and other principal cities rampaged through the business districts, vandalizing and looting stores. The rioters took advantage of a nationwide 2-day "sick out" occasioned by police dissatisfaction with the practice of assigning junior officers to temporary positions of authority without commensurate increases in salary. Successful bargaining between the Police Union and the authorities - probably helped by the disorders - quickly resolved the problem.
Technical and training facilities are of a high order. The National Institute of Technical Police in Stockholm is responsible for technical criminal investigation and research for the courts, public
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APPROVED FOR RELEASE: 2009/06/16: CIA-RDP01-00707R000200090019-6
