Mohammed cartoons: Swedish foreign minister resigns
Swedish Foreign Minister Laila Freivalds resigned today in the wake of the Mohammed cartoons, reports Spiegel Online. Her resignation comes after accusations that she acted unconstitutionally over the shutting down of a far-right Swedish website which published the Mohammed cartoons and also motivated its readers to send in new cartoons of Mohammed (see also former posting).
The opposition had claimed that Freivalds gave misleading information about the closure of the site, which belongs to an anti-Immigrant Swedish political party. She originally said that she did not know that her ministry was in contact with the company that was hosting the website. However, documents revealed this week that she has been informed. Political pressure on a company to shut down such a site is against the Swedish constitution. Freivalds said on Reuters: "Under the current circumstances I find it impossible to conduct my work and therefore choose to resign."
Sources: Reuters AlertNet, Spiegel Online (in German)
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