STOCKHOLM – The authorities ordered 16 public schools to shut in the central Swedish town of Borlange on April 22 after receiving a threat of violence, officials said.
Private schools also kept their doors closed after being told of the threat.
“The decision is a precautionary measure due to a potential threat of violence against school activities,” the Borlange municipality said in a statement.
It listed 16 municipal pre-schools, elementary and secondary schools that were to remain shut for the day. A number of private schools decided independently to close.
Police said in a statement they had received tips about “threats directed at schools in Borlange”.
“The police have opened a preliminary investigation into serious unlawful threats against a group. No one has been detained, and it is too early to say whether the threat has any substance or not,” police added.
Borlange, a town of about 45,000 people, is some 200km north of the capital, Stockholm.
Police were to hold a press conference at 11am local time (5pm Singapore time).
Attacks on schools are relatively rare in Sweden.
In February 2025, a 35-year-old gunman killed 10 people at an adult education centre in Orebro – Sweden’s worst mass shooting – which police said was motivated by the killer’s wish to end his life because of financial and psychological woes.
In March 2022, an 18-year-old student stabbed two teachers to death at a secondary school in the southern city of Malmo.
And in October 2015, three people were killed in a racially motivated attack at a school in the western town of Trollhattan by a sword-wielding assailant who was killed by police. AFP