2025-11-08 20:00
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2025-11-08 20:00
Special prison units will be established in Sweden for convicts aged 13 and over, said Swedish Minister of Justice Gunnar Stroemmer from the center-right Moderate Coalition Party on Monday.
According to the head of the Ministry of Justice, this is related to the lowering of the age of criminal responsibility for committing very serious crimes from July 1 next year from today's 15 to 13.
Stroemmer recalled that the Prison Service had previously received an order from the government to prepare places for young people aged 15-17, now this task will be extended. It is expected that initially there will be 100-150 places for all categories aged juvenile offenders. – School classes and various types of therapy will be held in youth departments – emphasized the Minister of Justice.
The Swedish government, responding to critics, assured that it would comply with the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. Separate units are to be created for boys (in six prisons) and girls (in two), and younger offenders will have no contact with older or adults.
Reform consisting in lowering the age of criminal responsibility to 13 years is to be valid for five years. – When 13 and 14-year-olds run around with automatic weapons, society must react with all its strength, stressed the chairman of the parliamentary justice committee, Henrik Vinge, from the far-right Sweden Democrats (SD) party.
The center-right cabinet of Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, who has been in power in Sweden since 2022, with the support of the SD, is tightening the law and increasing police powers in connection with the activities of drug gangs that recruit minors into their ranks.
From Stockholm Daniel Zyśk (PAP)
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