Two brothers have been indicted in the Swedish city of Gothenburg for killing their own mother and injuring her boyfriend in an apparently honour-motivated murder.
The two brothers aged 17 and 22 are accused of hitting their 38-year-old mother Nadja Blom and her boyfriend with a car as she was walking down the street last summer, killing Blom and injuring her boyfriend Lolo Kwiek.
All of those involved are members of the local Roma community in Gothenburg and the killing is believed to have been motivated by honour culture. The two brothers are said to have been angered their mother had divorced their father and was dating Kwiek, Expressen reports.
Lolo Kwiek, who survived the attack, spoke to Swedish media, saying that Blom had been on the receiving end of hatred and threats from family members prior to the killing but they had become worse after a Facebook livestream in which her relationship with Kwiek had been made public by accident.
Sweden: Man Murdered on Bus by Afghans in Suspected Honour Killing Was Stabbed 99 Times https://t.co/EOHKoeGS1I
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) October 25, 2020
Shortly after the killing, the two brothers posted their own video to Facebook explaining that they wanted revenge against their mother for divorcing their father, saying: “We ran over your son and our mother. Now you can go to the hospital and look for them, they might be dead, we don’t know,” and added: “So do we do with whores among us.”
The two brothers have been charged with murder, attempted murder, aiding and abetting murder, and aggravated assault. One of the brothers also faces charges of making unlawful threats, drug offences, and violating Swedish knife laws.
The grandparents of the brothers, who were also arrested on suspicion of trying to protect the two brothers, have also been charged with several offences, including unlawful threats and extortion.
Blom’s ex-husband, too, faces charges for unlawful threats.
240,000 young people in Sweden with migrant backgrounds live under oppressive ‘honour’ culture. https://t.co/adNIukTC0B
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) May 30, 2017
Prosecutor Hediye Kurt explained the case this week saying, “Nadja Blom had ended the relationship with her children’s father in a way that was not valid according to Roma tradition. The new relationship was not accepted by the collective and led to an escalation of hatred and intimidation of the plaintiff.”
While more commonly known as Gypsies, some Roma consider this term offensive. The group have roots in South Asia, and are not related to Travellers, an Irish heritage group also sometimes referred to as Gypsies.
The Gothenburg case is just the latest honour killing in Sweden in recent years. Another high-profile incident in 2020 involved three Afghan migrants, a man and his two sons, who a man 99 times on a bus in Kiruna.
Prosecutors stated that the father believed that the man was having an affair with his wife and planned the attack along with his sons.
Nearly 1,000 Honour Culture Crimes Reported in Sweden in 2020 https://t.co/0hFEwStsNo
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) March 10, 2021
