Proposal sparked intense debate in country but passed with 234 votes in favour and 94 against

Sweden’s parliament has passed a law lowering the minimum age to legally change gender from 18 to 16 and making it easier to get access to surgical interventions.

The law passed with 234 votes in favour and 94 against in Sweden’s 349-seat parliament.

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Health, jobs, defence, security and climate crisis all seen as more important than immigration with June elections approaching

Irregular migration is not the top priority for European voters despite the prominence of the issue in the media and political campaigning by rightwing parties over the last year, a new survey commissioned by the European parliament shows.

The Eurobarometer poll which tracks public opinions every quarter puts poverty and the cost of living crisis and social exclusion as the number one issue for voters who go to the polls in early June to elect a new European parliament.

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As his new film looks at society’s relationship with the camera, the double Palme d’Or winner talks about the power of the screen – big and small – and why the next generation will be Marxist

‘I have an idea,” says Ruben Östlund. “What if you were only allowed to use a camera if you have a licence? You need one for a gun – at least in sophisticated countries. The camera is also a powerful tool.”

He laughs, slim and bearded, in a book-lined coffee shop in Stockholm. A double Palme d’Or winner – for art satire The Square and bilious kill-the-rich comedy Triangle of Sadness – Östlund takes cinema seriously. Others, he fears, may be less responsible.

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The Swedish artist Lap-See Lam is drawing on the Cantonese operas of the 19th century to explore the ‘fiction’ of culture

Amid a polarising debate taking place in Sweden over what constitutes culture, the artist behind this year’s Nordic pavilion at the Venice Biennale hopes her multilingual opera staged on a Chinese dragon ship will act as a sort of riposte.

Lap-See Lam, a Swedish artist with Cantonese roots, is leading the Nordic countries’ offering at the international exhibition, which opens on 20 April, with a multidisciplinary artwork.

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Payman Maadi brings a fierce intelligence to his portrayal of a refugee seeking a secure new home for his family in Sweden

Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher from 2015 and Sean Durkin’s recent The Iron Claw show the sport of wrestling as deeply dysfunctional; wrestling fans might wonder if their favourite pastime is ever going to be depicted in the movies as vital and dramatic, like football, or even tragically noble and masculine, like boxing. Well … not in this film.

Motståndaran, or Opponent, is a tense, complex drama from Iranian-born and Denmark-based director Milad Alami, drawing on some of his own experiences as a refugee in northern Sweden. Payman Maadi (from Asghar Farhadi’s A Separation ) plays Imam, a grizzled Iranian wrestling champ seeking asylum in Sweden with his pregnant wife Maryam (Marall Nasiri) and their two young daughters. He and his family left behind a good, prosperous life in Tehran, where Maryam was a distinguished musician, and now they endure the humiliation of living in prison-like hostels.

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Israel’s inclusion in the lineup while war rages in Gaza may lead to the most controversial contest ever

Behind pink metal barriers at Malmö’s Folkets park, with signs of spring emerging from the flower beds, pictures of Abba’s Agnetha and Anni-Frid watch over proceedings as the area is transformed into “Eurovision village”. Somewhat fortuitously, after Loreen’s win in Liverpool last year , the southern Swedish city is preparing to host the contest in the 50th anniversary year of Abba’s breakthrough 1974 Eurovision-winning performance in Brighton of Waterloo.

When proceedings for “Eurovision week” kick off on 4 May before the grand final at the Malmö Arena seven days later, Sweden will be hoping to present a vision of peace and joy to a bitterly fractured world from its third largest and fastest growing city.

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Richard Grenell’s shadow foreign policy campaign is unsettling diplomats and threatens to collapse US interests

For Donald Trump, he is “my envoy”, the man apparently anointed as the former US president’s roving ambassador while he plots a return to the White House.

To critics , he is seen as “an online pest” and “a national disgrace” – and most importantly, the dark embodiment of what foreign policy in a second Trump administration would look like.

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For the best part of 15 years, maybe more, Sweden was rarely out of the piracy headlines. Kept busy by the endless antics of The Pirate Bay, there was always some type of chaos to contend with, and that kept everyone very busy.

With an entire generation exposed to piracy thanks to the most notorious pirates of them all, there was always a question mark over Sweden’s ability to turn its back on The Pirate Bay in favor of legitimate services. Spotify, another local phenomenon, played a key role when it specifically targeted pirates; its product is still vastly superior to any music-focused piracy service available anywhere.

While still not averse to dabbling around the main brace of The Pirate Bay, towards the middle of the last decade, Swedes were increasingly turning to an old pirate friend sporting a new coat of paint. Video streaming had been around for years but when packaged up as a consumer-like product, accessed via a living-room set-top box rather than a PC, Swedes had their collective heads turned. They weren’t alone.

Swedes and the New Piracy Boogeyman

Starting around 2016, give or take depending on region, pirate IPTV services exploded globally. Acting as a direct replacement, for some even an antidote to runaway expensive TV subscription packages, the IPTV boom most likely had entertainment companies reluctantly nostalgic for The Pirate Bay.

A study published by the EU Intellectual Property Office in November 2019 revealed ( pdf ) that Sweden and the Netherlands were the most prolific consumers of pirate IPTV services in the entire bloc, with 9% of each population already exposed.

At the same time, legal consumption was trending up but with an overall piracy rate of around 20%, rightsholders could still see potential profit slipping away.

Pressure Increases on Players in the Illicit Market

In common with its counterparts in Europe, Sweden had already been paying more attention to those involved in the supply and sale of pirate IPTV subscriptions. Most investigations fell to local anti-piracy group Rights Alliance which represents the interests of large local broadcasters and film companies, plus those of the majors in Hollywood.

In 2022, a then 23-year-old was criminally convicted and ordered to pay around $230,000 in damages to local rightsholders. Soon after a subscription reseller received a six-month sentence , a step up from the community sentences seen earlier. Other cases came and went, mostly ending in success for the plaintiffs.

Anticipation Following Lengthy Investigation

In 2019, the same year that Sweden and the Netherlands were dueling for top spot on the EU’s IPTV piracy list, Rights Alliance referred an IPTV piracy case to local police. The group believed the man was behind Dreamhost, one of the more popular pirate IPTV brands in Sweden and therefore a priority target.

Regardless of the target, no investigation of this type is ever straightforward. As Rights Alliance reported in 2023, the cross-border nature of the offending can require evidence to be obtained from overseas, meaning that cases can drag on for quite some time. In this case, already four years.

Nevertheless, Rights Alliance described the evidence as extensive. A resident of southern Sweden, the man was the alleged registrant of the service’s domain name. He moderated the service’s chats, for which the logs had been obtained, and he answered questions posed by customers.

On top of IP address tracking evidence and email address data, a financial investigation reportedly identified two bitcoin wallets linked to the suspect, and data revealing that almost SEK 2,000,000 was received in 2020 alone, roughly $189,000 at today’s rates. Police also found payments between the suspect’s accounts and an account linked to Dreamhost.

Sales to Friends and Family, Fear, Remote Control

Last September in advance of his trial, Rights Alliance revealed that under questioning, the man admitted doing some technical work for Dreamhost and selling subscriptions to family and friends. He also claimed that he didn’t know who was behind Dreamhost and at times, since he felt threatened, allowed his computer to be controlled remotely, by a person he couldn’t identify.

Whether the claims had any substance is unclear but the rightsholders behind the prosecution would be requesting serious compensation for damage caused by the service, Rights Alliance said.

Guilty Verdict

In an October 2023 announcement, Rights Alliance revealed that the man had been found guilty. The extensive evidence was noted once again and reference was made to the SEK 2,000,000 the man received in 2020. The sentence itself appeared to come as a disappointment, however.

“The penalty was determined to be a suspended sentence and 100 daily fines,” Rights Alliance reported, a reference to the Swedish system where fines are calculated based on a person’s daily income. The number of ‘day fines’ imposed is meant to mirror the amount lost had the convicted been imprisoned without earnings.

Noting that the man had avoided being sentenced under the much tougher regime now in place, Rights Alliance said little else.

Decision Went to Appeal

A Rights Alliance statement published Thursday summarizes a verdict also handed down yesterdayby the Patent and Market Appeal Court. Rights Alliance didn’t post a copy of the decision and the court is yet to make it public, but it seems likely that the rightsholders appealed against the relatively light sentence handed down last October.

The verdict as reported suggests that the conditional sentence and 100 day fines stands. However, the SEK 2,000,000 in damages payable to rightsholders is now being reported as SEK 1,700,000. A SEK 300,000 reduction transforms the $189,000 award to one just shy of $160,000.

“The verdict shows that it takes a long time from report to verdict, but that despite everything, it is not possible to avoid the long arm of the law,” Rights Alliance concludes.

When searching fruitlessly for a copy of the decision handed down Thursday, we stumbled across another case that appears to challenge the assertion that the long arm of the law is inevitable.

Details Matter

The case involves an appeal of a judgment handed down by the Patent and Market Court in June 2022 and a person named only as L.K., who was accused of copyright infringement in connection with the website swedeniptv.se.

“According to the indictment, L.K.’s involvement in the offense primarily consisted of paying for the domain and administering the website, charging customers, and marketing the website. Secondly, he is alleged to have promoted others’ illegal distribution of the films, which occurred via the website swedeniptv.se,” a decision by the court of appeal reads.

“The Patent and Market Court of Appeal assesses that it is already evident from L.K.’s own statements that he had the primary role concerning the website swedeniptv.se. However, his main objections to the indictment are that the films in question were not available via the website and that he acted as a so-called ‘gatekeeper’ for other individuals who remotely controlled his computers.”

It appears that when L.K. was on trial, the prosecutor (acting for movie company plaintiffs Swedish Film Industry, Nordisk Film, Disney, Universal, and Sony) alleged that the movies were made available to the public via the website swedeniptv.se. In reality, people purchased subscriptions from swedeniptv.se and then received a link via email which linked to servers in the Netherlands.

The court of appeal found that films being made available via an email link to a Dutch website was something “not apparent from the description of the act” provided by the prosecution. As a result it had not been shown beyond reasonable doubt that L.K. committed the act the prosecutor alleged.

The panel did not reach a unanimous decision. In light of the facts presented during case, including the defendant’s admissions, an objective view of the arguments of those who dissented reveals reasonable conclusions that could’ve prevailed anywhere else on a different day.

They appear to have been thwarted on a technicality, one that seems like it should’ve been completely avoidable

From: TF , for the latest news on copyright battles, piracy and more.

The meteorite was ruled to be ‘immovable property’ after it fell on to private property in 2020

A Swedish landowner won a legal battle on Thursday to keep a 14kg (31lb) meteorite when an appeals court ruled that such rocks should be considered “immovable property” and part of the land where they are found.

The land on which the meteorite landed contains iron, which the meteorite is made of. Therefore it “cannot be easily separated from what is usually regarded as (immovable) property”, the Svea court of appeal ruled.

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