05 April, 2006
Neutral Sweden cooperated with the Nazis more than previously thought, according to a study. Sweden's Lutheran church applied Nazi race laws to stop Germans living in Sweden during World War II from marrying Jews, according to research results presented on Tuesday in Stockholm. The state church stopped at least five such marriages from taking place, the study by Lund University researcher Anders Jarlert concludes. Jarlet found that the state church acted on the recommendation of the Swedish foreign ministry, which sought to appease Germany to stave off an invasion. Newspapers gagged criticism of Hitler, the occupation of Norway and the murder of millions of Jews in concentration camps. “We are finding new areas of collaboration which we didn’t know about,” said Stockholm University historian Klas Amark, who coordinated the study. The investigation was launched following a call by prime minister Göran Persson at a landmark conference on the Holocaust, held in Stockholm in 2000, to have a closer look at Sweden's attitude during World War II.
