Once seen as one of Europe’s safest countries, Sweden continues to be gripped by gangland violence that is spilling into other countries, including Spain.
At the heart of the bloodshed lies a feud between rival criminal networks – chiefly Foxtrot and Rumba – whose leaders once worked side by side before turning their guns on each other.
Also involved is the Dalen Network, which has been linked to high-profile acts of gangland violence in recent years.
On Friday, Swedish rapper Hamza Karimi, 25, known artistically as Hamko, was shot multiple times just after 2.30pm while walking in Puerto Banus.
According to police sources, Karimi was on the phone when a 38-year-old man approached him, drew a firearm from behind his back and opened fire at close range.
In his songs, ‘Hamko’ boasted about guns and a gangster lifestyle. According to Swedish media, he grew up in territory controlled by the Dalen Network, and was linked to criminal gangs.
Foxtrot v Rumba: From brothers-in-arms to sworn enemies
The story of Sweden’s mafia problem begins with the rise of Rawa Majid, a Swedish-Kurdish crime boss better known as The Kurdish Fox.
From his base in Turkey, Majid is accused of directing one of Sweden’s largest criminal organisations – the Foxtrot Network.
Police say he built his empire on narcotics trafficking, money laundering and brutal enforcement, creating a decentralised structure of lieutenants and teenage foot soldiers who flooded Swedish streets with drugs.
Among Majid’s most trusted associates was Ismail Abdo, a man whose ambition and ruthlessness would one day spark one of Europe’s most violent gang wars.
Around 2023, Abdo split from Foxtrot following an internal power struggle, in a rupture that gave birth to his own faction, known as Rumba.
What followed was a cycle of revenge that shocked Sweden. In 2023, Abdo’s mother was murdered in her Uppsala home, in a killing investigators believe was ordered by Foxtrot. Since then, tit-for-tat shootings and bombings have claimed scores of lives, many of them innocent bystanders.
Swedish mafia activity in Spain
In August this year, an alleged teenage hitman and his accomplice were arrested for planning to carry out an assassination on the Costa del Sol.
A coordinated operation between Spanish police, Europol and Swedish authorities prevented the planned murder, leading to the arrest of six suspects linked to a violent Nordic criminal network.
Two of the detainees – one of them a minor – had flown in from Gothenburg, Sweden, on June 29, allegedly contracted over social media to carry out a killing.
In 2024, a 17-year-old male was also sent from Sweden to Benalmadena with instructions to kill, staying in local hotels and using a scooter to scope out a target associated with a motorcycle gang.
His arrest, moments before being handed a weapon of war by his two Swedish colleagues, led to the dismantling of an organisation dedicated to recruiting minors to commit murders.
Incredibly, the group was run by a Swedish national who had just turned 15 and lived in Alicante. He used Telegram and Signal under aliases such as Donald Trump, The Recruiter, and Ms. Evelina.
‘He was the f*****g boss,’ a police officer told El Pais. ‘He ordered murderers like someone orders a pizza.’
Arrests and safe havens
Both Majid and Abdo fled Sweden years ago and are believed to hold Turkish citizenship, placing them beyond the easy reach of Swedish justice. Ankara has repeatedly refused extradition requests, straining diplomatic relations between the two countries.
But in July 2025, Turkish police finally moved in. Abdo was arrested during a coordinated operation that saw 19 suspects detained across several Turkish cities.
He is currently being held in pre-trial detention, though Turkish authorities have not committed to sending him back to Sweden. It is not the first time Abdo has been taken into custody in Turkey – he was briefly detained in 2024 before being released on bail, despite an active international warrant.
Meanwhile, Majid – the Kurdish Fox himself – remains at large, continuing to operate from Turkish soil according to Swedish intelligence. He, too, is unlikely to face extradition any time soon.
International intrigue
Swedish intelligence services have repeatedly warned that the feud has now spilled into geopolitics.
Both Foxtrot and Rumba are believed to have been courted by Iranian operatives seeking to use their networks for attacks on Israeli or Jewish interests in Europe.
The United States has since sanctioned Majid and several associates, accusing them of acting as proxies for Tehran.
Hamko’s murder is celebrated in the suburbs
According to Swedish reports, people linked to gang networks in Sweden have been celebrating the murder of Hamko on social media, including by publishing videos of fireworks on social media.
One of the clips was recorded from the Dalen Network’s turf in southern Stockholm – where Hamko and his former friend, the rapper Einar, had strong ties to from childhood.
The Enskededalen district is where the Dalen Network is most active and which in recent years has seen some of the country’s most high-profile acts of violence.
The conflict has mainly concerned a drug war between the Dalen Network and Foxtrot, which has resulted in several shootings and bombings – and many innocent people have been caught in the crossfire.
A nation under siege
In 2023, Sweden recorded more fatal shootings per capita than almost any other European country.
Police admit they are fighting an uphill battle. The ringleaders live comfortably abroad while disposable teenage recruits do the killing. For every arrest, another young man takes the fallen shooter’s place.
Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer warned last year that the problem cannot be solved overnight, estimating it will take a decade to bring Sweden’s gang crisis under control.
Roots in segregation and inequality
Most members of these gangs are second-generation immigrants, many raised in Sweden’s segregated suburbs. Such areas are created by past housing policies that concentrated poverty and unemployment.
While Sweden frequently tops international rankings for migrant integration, experts say the picture on the ground tells another story: weak Swedish-language requirements, social isolation, and limited opportunities for young people have deepened the divide between ethnic Swedes and immigrant communities.
Around 20% of Sweden’s 10.6 million residents are now foreign-born – more than double the figure in 2000.
For decades, the country prided itself on an open-door policy toward refugees and migrants.
But under the current right-leaning coalition, backed in parliament by the far-right Sweden Democrats, that stance has shifted sharply.
The government has pledged to cut irregular migration, crack down on labour fraud and dismantle what it calls a ‘shadow society’, referring to undocumented foreigners working off the books.
