Stories from Sweden,
the Humanitarian Superpower # 6
the country that grants the highest number of residence permits to asylum seekers in the EU
“Sweden is a humanitarian superpower.”
Carl Bildt, Foreign Minister, Sweden
An official of Migrationsverket (Migration Board) in the south of Sweden reports from an authentic asylum interview with a Syrian family that has just arrived in Sweden. Similar stories have been told by other officials in other parts of the country. This interview was conducted before Sweden decided to grant ALL who claim that they are Syrians who are coming directly from Syria, permanent residence permits.
They have no individual grounds but have come here because of the conflict, they say. I tell them that they will get temporary residence permit. They have not counted on getting permanent residence permits, so that is okay. When I wonder if they have any questions for me, there are four key questions they always ask:
- Can you tell us how to proceed in order to hide our money and possessions from the Swedish authorities?
- How fast can we travel back and still maintain our temporary residence permits? And when we go back to Syria, will Sweden then ensure our safety there?
- How do we get money from the Swedish state to start a business here?
- Will Sweden give us money for the cost of smuggling us here; it was very expensive? Since it is written in all newspapers in Syria that Sweden welcomes Syrian refugees, Sweden should also pay the costs of smuggling trips for us who come to this country!
This is what we at the Migration Board have to deal with. We also see a great deal of fake job offers. Many of the Syrians who now are asylum seekers, have come to the country as labor migrants (ie not on asylum grounds), but they have not worked one single day in Sweden because there were no jobs for real. They have cheated the system and have come here based on fake job offers from friends or relatives who were already in Sweden and who supplied them with false contracts, so that they could apply for work permits from the Migration Board.
The reason why some people — Syrians are not the only ones presenting fake job offers, by the way — come to Sweden on job visas and then apply for asylum, is that as asylum seekers they get everything, including housing, paid by the Swedish state, and they get a monthly allowance without having to work.
Comment: These are just some examples of how badly the Swedish asylum system works. There are many more. The General Director of the Migration Board and the staff of the authority know about the lies and frauds as does the Swedish government and, of course, it is well known in all the countries from which people come to seek asylum, that the system in Sweden is unstable, unpredictable and weak and that you get away with lies and deception easier there than in other countries. That is one of the reasons that the small country is the — by far — biggest receiver of both real and fake asylum seekers per capita in all of Europe.
Here is what Spiegel Online International wrote about the situation in Germany on 31 August 2013: German Asylum System Hits Breaking Point. Excerpt from the article:
Germany has recently seen a significant rise in the number of asylum seekers arriving in the country. Its shelters are overwhelmed and opposition to new ones has recently turned ugly. Refugees themselves argue that the system is broken.
In Sweden, the situation is as bad, if not worse, but the vast problems are hardly talked about at all. No other country than Sweden comes even close to the high numbers of asylum seekers mainly from the Middle East. Plus their families.
Why? How is it possible that the very small country in the north has become the biggest “asylum country” in the EU? Maybe one reason is that Sweden wants to be “best in class” and wants to show that it is the most humanitarian country in the world? As the Swedish Foreign Minister has said:
“Sweden is a humanitarian superpower.”
Do the Swedes agree with him? Do the people who have come as asylum seekers agree after having lived in the country for a couple of years? Those are questions that hardly anyone asks in Sweden.
