In Sweden, the government sticks to its line that Swedish citizens in Lebanon can leave on commercial flights.
4.10. 22:12•Updated 4.10. 22:13
In Sweden, the opposition party Social Democrats has demanded that the government start preparing the evacuation of Swedes in Lebanon. Party chairman Magdalena Andersson think Sweden could at least evacuate the Swedish children.
Foreign minister Maria Malmer Stenergard says to Swedish TV to SVT that the parents are responsible because they have taken their children to Lebanon against travel recommendations. In addition, some of the Swedes in the country apparently live permanently in Lebanon, the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs estimates for SVT.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is almost a year old days advised to avoid all travel to Lebanon and recommended Swedish citizens there to leave the country.
Foreign Minister Malmer Stenergard states that Lebanon can still be reached by commercial flights.
According to the Sweden Democrats, some of them should not have a Swedish passport
The government’s support party, the Ruotsidemokratit, considers the current policy to be correct. Party chairman by Jimmie Åkesson with Among the Swedish citizens in Lebanon are persons who should not have been given a Swedish passport.
Åkesson said in SVT’s discussion that many of those staying in Lebanon once came to Sweden as refugees and received citizenship. Now, however, they have traveled to the country they fled from.
According to the estimate of the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, there are currently 2,000–3,000 Swedish citizens in Lebanon.
In Sweden, it has been pointed out that the other Nordic countries are also not planning to evacuate their citizens at this stage, although Denmark, for example, is helping to book plane tickets. The Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs has agreed on Lebanon with the MEA airline regarding the right to pre-emption of tickets. The Finnish embassy in Beirut has also assisted Finns in getting on commercial flights.