sweden

World News

In Sweden, Remote-Control Airport Is A Reality

10:35pm February 28, 2015

by Ari Shapiro

Sweden is the first country in the world to use new technology to land passenger airplanes remotely. At an airport in a tiny town, flights are guided by operators sitting miles away.

Queue Listen Now

Christian Tengblad (right) and his fellow fare dodger are part of the group Planka.nu.

World News

Group Urges Swedes To Evade Subway Fares, And Even Insures Against Fines

2:06pm February 26, 2015

by Ari Shapiro

Fare-dodging in Stockholm's system has become a movement, and the group's members don't try to hide what they're doing — in fact, they advertise it.

Queue Listen Now

Surströmming, a fermented herring considered to be a famous delicacy in Sweden, is also known as one of the most pungent foods in the world.

Surströmming Revisited: Eating Sweden's Famously Stinky Fish

7:39pm February 19, 2015

by Ari Shapiro

Sweden has the distinction of producing surströmming, one of the foulest-smelling foods in the world. More than a decade ago, NPR's Ari Shapiro tried eating it and failed. It's time for a rematch.

Queue Listen Now

Icehotel is located 120 miles above the Arctic Circle. The temperature outside is well below zero, but inside the hotel — while still, of course, below freezing — it's much warmer, hovering in the low 20s.

The Arctic Circle's Coolest Accommodations Turn 25 Years Old

10:07am January 30, 2015

by Ari Shapiro

The Icehotel in Sweden, built in winter and vanishing in spring, is the original hotel carved from snow and ice bricks. It's also an art project; sculptors compete for the chance to carve out rooms.

Queue Listen Now

A soldier from the Swedish army participates in a military exercise at Hagshult Airbase in Sweden in November.

World News

Russian Threats Expose Europe's Military Cutbacks

11:27am January 27, 2015

by Ari Shapiro

A series of military confrontations and growing tensions between Western Europe and Russia show how ill-prepared European countries are after years of cutbacks.

Queue Listen Now

A year after his cancer diagnosis, Henning Mankell is working on a new novel, and he just directed Shakespeare's Hamlet in his adopted country of Mozambique.

'Wallander' Author Henning Mankell On The Catastrophe Of Cancer

9:11pm January 17, 2015

by Martin Scholz

The famed Swedish author of the Kurt Wallander mystery novels was diagnosed a year ago — "a catastrophe for me," he says; since then, he's talked more about the disease than the drama of forensics.

Anita Ekberg in a 1956 photo taken during rehearsals for a guest appearance on the Frankie Laine Time.

World News

Anita Ekberg, '50s Screen Star And Sex Symbol, Dies At 83

1:01pm January 11, 2015

by Scott Neuman

The Swedish-born actress' most famous role was as Sylvia in Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita. She died outside Rome this morning.

Parishioners attend a mid-week prayer service at St. Gabriel Syrian Orthodox Church. Since the Syrian war began three years ago, the town has seen a marked increase in Syrian refugees resettling in Södertalje, straining many city services.

World News

Sweden's Tolerance Is Tested By Tide Of Syrian Immigrants

6:27pm December 05, 2014

by Joanna Kakissis

One-third of the residents in the city of Sodertalje are from the Middle East, many of them recent arrivals from Syria. The influx is testing Sweden's liberal immigration policies.

Queue Listen Now

The story of Arthur, a stray who adopted a team of Swedish athletes competing in Ecuador, spread quickly after he refused to be left behind.

Dog Follows Athletes Through Mud And Water, And Melts Hearts

7:46am November 26, 2014

by Bill Chappell

After a stray dog met a team of Swedish adventure athletes in Ecuador, he ran for miles through rough terrain and swam to keep up. Now Arthur the dog is famous — and it all started with a meatball.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange attends an August news conference at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London. On Thursday, a Swedish appeals court upheld a 2010 detention order against Assange on accusations of sexual assault.

Swedish Appeals Court Upholds Detention Order For Julian Assange

12:59pm November 20, 2014

by Scott Neuman

Prosecutors want to question the WikiLeaks founder, who has taken refuge in the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, over allegations that he sexually assaulted two women in 2010.