Towards the end of one of the longest days of the year, a glorious summer evening, I asked a friend as we strolled through the idyllic centre of Stockholm what all the sirens and police cars whizzing past were about. Probably another shooting or gangland punch-up in the suburbs, he responded. That fear of intensifying gun crime was the sombre backdrop to an exceptionally close general election in Sweden.
Gun violence is out of control. Last month, a mother and child were caught in crossfire at a playground. A decade ago, before bleak, murderous Scandi television drama became so popular elsewhere, Sweden had one of the lowest rates of fatal shootings in Europe. No longer. It’s now among the worst. Already this year there have
