Hot on the heels of Denmark sounding the alarm about Swedish gang violence—especially involving underage criminals—crossing the border, Norway now appears to be increasingly worried.
Norway, which shares a more than 1,600 km long border with Sweden, has documented criminal networks from its eastern neighbor established in all twelve of its police districts, with several known narcotics-dealing gangs already active there. The organized crime division of the Norwegian police now fears that other criminal activities, such as money laundering and violence, are imminent—in line with trends witnessed in Sweden.
Case in point: three gang criminals from Sweden have been charged with murder after a house in a residential suburb of Oslo was blown up last year.
Norwegian police want to coordinate border patrols with Swedish law enforcement agencies to hamper narcotics trafficking in particular.
Tomas Staerk, head of investigations in the Norwegian Police District East, told Swedish state broadcaster SVT police are concerned about the use of extreme violence “and that the Swedish gangs will recruit vulnerable young people.”
The concern about young violent criminals is well-founded. The number of children under the age of 15 suspected of involvement in murder plots has tripled in the past year, according to the Swedish prosecution authority. Last year by the end of July, authorities had identified 26 children as suspects involved in murder cases. This year, during the same period, that number has risen to 93.
Police say the sharp rise in ‘child soldiers’ can be attributed to the recruitment moving from the streets to the Internet. With the prevalence of mobile phones in the hands of children, the time between posting a contract killing online and carrying out the crime can be just a matter of hours, prosecutor Lisa Dos Santos told SVT. Young people are increasingly taking on assignments without knowing the client or the target, she said.
Illegal ‘hit lists’ with names of targets and price tags—of up to a million Swedish kronor (about €87,000)—are advertised on social media and encrypted messaging apps. This means children can be recruited by criminal gangs with parents being none the wiser.
Dos Santos wants parents to take more responsibility and be aware of what their children do on their mobile phones, but she is also calling on tech companies to crack down on criminal recruitment:
They have enabled countless murders. I would like to see pressure put on these tech giants to prevent this from happening on their platforms when so many lives are at stake.
