Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Twenty years ago today: the assassination of Olof Palme

Social Democracy Now | 28.02.2006 01:29 | Workers' Movements

Today, February 28, 2006, social democrats all over the world mourn the assassination of Olof Palme, the last of the great Swedish social democrats. This article discusses the murder.


Today, February 28, 2006, social democrats all over the world mourn the assassination of Olof Palme, the last of the great Swedish social democrats and probably the last real social democrat ever to hold the top job in any country until the unexpected and still astonishing rise of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela.
Do we know who murdered Palme? Perhaps we do. A petty criminal and longtime drug abuser, Christer Petterson, who died in 2004, confessed to the murder in 2001. He was identified as the assassin by Palme's wife, Lisbet, who was herself shot during the attack. Then, on February 24, 2006, Pettersson's close friend Roger Östlund claimed on his death bed that he had actually seen Pettersson shoot Olof Palme. (SOURCE)
BELOW: Christer Petterson:
Two motives have been offered for the murder. In 2001, Petterson's friend, Swedish journalist Gert Fylking, told the BBC that Petterson had had no grievance against Palme personally, but that while he was in prison, he had met someone who had. So he had murdered Palme to avenge the other man's grievance. (SOURCE)
A marginally more plausible motive surfaced this week, when Östlund claimed that Petterson had mistaken Palme for a drug dealer: 'Östlund, who is now dying in hospital, says that Palme was simply the victim of mistaken identity - the real target was amphetamine dealer Sigge Cedergren, whom they had intended to attack as part of a turf war among drug dealers. Östlund says he and another man had planned to attack Cedergren together with Pettersson, but did not know that Pettersson had a gun. Friends of Östlund told Expressen that he has not spoken out before because he was afraid of being killed.' (SOURCE)
Although it's always nice to have a perp, a great deal about the assassination still doesn't make sense. Although he had murdered someone before - in 1970 - there is no evidence Pettersson ever owned a gun. The 1970 murder weapon had been a bayonet and in the other violent incidents in which he was involved, a knife had been used. Östlund says that he did not even know that night that Pettersson had had a gun. The obvious questions, therefore, are: how did Pettersson get the gun? And are either motives plausible?
Superficially, this looks a textbook case of assassination by a 'lone nut,' and perhaps it was always meant to look this way. But can we really believe that Pettersson just happened to be looking to kill a drug dealer at the exact same time and the exact same location that the Swedish prime minister happened to be out without his bodyguard? And on a cold (minus 7 degrees) February night? Why would Petterson have expected to see Cedergren on the street at around midnight on such a cold night?
The fact that Pettersen had a gun on him and fastened on Palme as his victim suggests the possibility that he was somehow manipulated into committing the crime. There is overwhelming evidence that something unusual was afoot on the night Palme was murdered. Palme's behaviour was by no means normal that night, leading to speculation that he was supposed to meet somebody, and there is also overwhelming evidence of police complicity in the crime.(SOURCE)
At the time Palme was murdered, he was a very unpopular figure indeed with three interlocking sets of actors: the governments of South Africa, Israel and the United States. The same nexus of rightwing South Africans which was linked to the assassination in 1996 just happens to have included in its web Jack Abramoff, the Republican party operative currently embroiled in corruption scandals, whose connections back in the 80s went from South Africa to both the Reagan White House and Israel. It would seem a fair bet that Abramoff knows why Palme was killed: after all, he was a central figure in the network of Palme's enemies.
It is therefore the question of the gun that ensures that the case still cannot be regarded as solved. Although Petterson confessed to the crime and has furnished at least two motives for doing so, he has never said anything about the gun: where it came from, why he happened to have it on him that night, and what happened to it afterwards. This implies that at the very least a second person was involved - someone who supplied the weapon, manipulated his movements that night, and who disposed of the weapon afterwards. The only logical reason why Petterson never addressed the matter of the gun is that he refused to implicate one or more other people.
If Östlund was really there - and I don't know of any witnesses who say they saw a second person lurking around with the gunman - he surely would have to know the answers to these questions. Isn't it a little too convenient that Östlund says he didn't know anything about the gun? So let's consider the possibility that while Östlund was dying, persons unknown approached him and made it worth his while to issue a bogus statement confirming that he had seen Petterson shoot Palme, thereby confirming Petterson's earlier confession. This would be a perfect way to shut down suspicions of a conspiracy, wouldn't it? Most people would be inclined to say, well that clinches it! So while I am convinced that Petersson was the gunman, I strongly question whether Östlund's deathbed confession should be accepted at face value. And such good timing too, just days before the twentieth anniversary of the tragedy.
BELOW: The crime scene:

By Social Democracy Now
 http://www.blogigo.co.uk/socialdemocracynow

Social Democracy Now
- Homepage: http://www.blogigo.co.uk/socialdemocracynow

Comments

Display the following comment

  1. Gladio? — Sista Kontraktet
Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech