Conference turris::scandia

Associated Press Wed 12-MAR-1986 07:36                                  

                 Carlsson Elected To Succeed Palme
    
                      By STEPHEN H. MILLER
                    Associated Press Writer
    
    STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - Parliament elected Social Democrat
    Ingvar Carlsson to succeed assassinated Prime Minister Olof Palme
    today without any opposing votes.
    
    Non-socialist parties, which form a minority in the Riksdag, or
    parliament, abstained from the vote, making a gesture of support
    for Carlsson's succession while declining to endorse his party's
    politics.
    
    Carlsson, 51, was approved with 178 supporting votes and 159
    abstentions. After a brief round of handshakes, the Riksdag moved
    directly into a partisan budget debate.
    
    Lars Tobisson, a Moderate party member and the first speaker in
    the budget debate, told the Riksdag that voting for Carlsson
    "would be going too far in good will."
    
    The lanky, bespectacled Carlsson, who had been head of an
    emergency caretaker government since Palme was assassinated Feb.
    28, gave no election speech. He promised after the killing that he
    would carry on Palme's policies and was expected to announce his
    government and its policy plans Thursday.

Associated Press Thu 13-MAR-1986 11:41                      Sweden-Government

 Palme's Successor Vows to Maintain Palme Legacy; Hints at Conciliatory Style
    
                         By STEPHEN H. MILLER
                        Associated Press Writer
    
    STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - The newly elected prime minister today
    vowed to remain loyal to the social welfare programs maintained by
    Olof Palme, but hinted at a more conciliatory style than that of
    the assassinated socialist leader.
    
    "We stand united in the common values of this country," Ingvar
    Carlsson said in his first speech as prime minister to the Swedish
    parliament, the Riksdag. "We are united also in invincible
    resolution that nothing, least of all violence, shall compel us to
    give up."
    
    Like Palme, whom Carlsson served as deputy premier, the new
    Social Democratic prime minister called on Swedes to hold down
    wages and costs in an effort to bring this Scandinavian nation
    "step by step" out of economic troubles.
    
    Carlsson said Swedes expected government "without contrived
    friction and without unnecessary conflicts."
    
    "In that spirit, the government wishes to pursue a policy for
    the whole Swedish people," he said.
    
    Palme, though deeply admired by his supporters, was seen by
    opponents as often abrasive and sometimes arrogant, and as a leader
    who enjoyed more political combat than necessary. The son of a
    warehouse worker and a cleaning woman, Carlsson is considered by
    some analysts as more likely to unite Swedes.
    
    Party officials said Palme's place in parliament will be taken
    by 43-year-old Barbro Evermo, who once worked as a cleaning woman
    in Stockholm.
    
    In the Swedish parliamentary system, candidates who just missed
    election on their own become members of a pool of stand-ins who
    serve as needed when legislators cannot attend sessions.
    
    Mrs. Evermo stood in for Palme several times in that capacity,
    the officials said.
    
    Carlsson said his government would continue Palme's concerns
    with disarmament, Third World problems and refugees, and maintain
    the array of social welfare programs built up over the years by the
    governing Social Democrats.
    
    Carlsson, 51, left major Cabinet posts filled by the same
    ministers who held the jobs under the government assembled by Palme
    last fall as he began his fourth term as prime minister.
    
    One minor change was to add the environmental matters formerly
    handled by Carlsson himself to the work of Birgitta Dahl, 48, a
    Cabinet minister who will continue to deal with energy matters as
    well.
    
    Carlsson was elected prime minister in the Riksdag Wednesday in
    the first legislative session since Palme was killed.
    Non-socialists withheld their votes as a sign that they supported
    Carlsson's succession while not endorsing his party's policies.

    Yesterday, September 9, 1987, Sweden's Prime Minister Ingvar Carlsson
    paid an official visit to Washington, D.C. This was the first official
    visit by a Swedish prime minister in 26 years.  What follows has been
    extracted from an article written in anticipation of that visit by Gary
    Yerkey, published in the September 2, 1987 issue of the Christian
    Science Monitor. 


    United States officials describe the [Swedish] prime minister as a man
    of strength, of quiet leadership -- a stable, solid individual. 

    Such words were rarely used by these officials to describe Mr.
    Carlsson's predecessor in February 1986. Palme, a passionate Socialist
    whose leftist foreign policy views were often at odds with those of the
    US government, had headed Sweden's Social Democratic Party for more
    than a decade. 

    It was Palme who, in the US view, initiated and prolonged the
    much-publicized public rows between the two countries throughout the
    1970s and into the early 1908s, first over Vietnam, then over the
    Reagan administration's policies in Central America. 

    Unlike Palme, Sweden's new premier has shown little interest since
    taking office in March 1986 in projecting his social conscience onto
    the world stage. "His international interests are not extensive," said
    one US official, adding that Carlsson also has actively sought to
    minimize the differences between his country, which is officially
    neutral in international affairs, and the US. "We're now handling our
    problems behind the scenes, keeping them more private, less public,"
    the offical said. 

    Swedish officials, however, say that Carlsson is expected to do much
    more than listen during his visit to Washington -- and many Americans
    may not like what he has to say. High on the prime minister's agenda
    will be the Reagan administration's continuing involvement in Central
    America, particularly Nicaragua, where the US is supporting the contra
    rebels. "We're still opposed to US policy there," one official
    emphasized, "and we intend to make our feelings well-known. We've
    agreed to disagree on Central America," he added. "But we here in
    Sweden firmly hope that that won't make dialogue in other areas
    impossible." 

    Relations between the US and Sweden have improved significantly even
    within the past year, particularly in the field of trade. On a visit to
    Stockholm last May, the late US Commerce Secretary Malcolm Baldridge
    lifted restrictions on certain US high-tech sales to Sweden after the
    Swedish government promised to tighten curbs on exports of US equipment
    to the Soviet bloc. 

    A year earlier, the Commerce Department had imposed a $440,000 fine on
    Asea AB, a Swedish engineering company, for selling US computers to the
    Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia from 1980 to 1983 -- the largest civil
    penalty imposed on a foreign company for violating US laws controlling
    exports to potential adversaries. 

    The Swedish people seem to like Carlsson. Since taking office, he has
    recorded the highest popularity rating of any Swedish leader since
    World War II. 

>    High on the prime minister's agenda will be the Reagan administration's
>    continuing involvement in Central America, particularly Nicaragua,
>    where the US is supporting the contra rebels. "We're still opposed to
>    US policy there," one official emphasized, "and we intend to make our
>    feelings well-known.  
    
    I, for one, am pleased with the Swedish government's position on US
    meddling in the internal affairs of other sovereign nations, including
    Central American states. I wish Mr. Carlsson had more influence on US
    foreign policy than he has; I agree that his planned low-key approach
    will do more good than direct confrontation with the Reaganites.
    
    Unfortunately, the US has a long history of interfering with the
    internal politics of Latin American countries. It's our heritage,
    Mr. Carlsson, albeit a shameful one!
     
    Neil

    From: [email protected] (H. Peter Anvin)
    Newsgroups: soc.culture.nordic
    Subject: Ingvar Carlssson just spoke at Northwestern
    Date: 24 Jun 91 05:35:52 GMT
    Organization: Northwestern University
 
    Yesterday, June 22, Ingvar Carlsson (Sweden's Prime Minister) spoke at
    Northwestern University's graduation.  I was present at the event,
    although not as a graduate ;-) .
 
    Carlsson coming to Northwestern had elicit some skepticism from
    primarily the Conservative (and most anti-rest-of-the-world) part of
    the student body, but the speech went very well.  Carlsson exercised
    his limited English very well.  His subject (as could have been
    predicted) was the necessity for international cooperation, which
    apparently went very well with the students who interrupted him several
    times with applause and cheers; at the end of the speech they gave him
    a standing ovation.
 
              /Peter
    -- 
    MAIL: [email protected]   ([email protected] after this summer)
    "finger" the address above for more information.

    As a result of the 1991 elections, Carlsson has resigned as Prime
    Minister. See note 290.12 for details

            STOCKHOLM, Sweden (Reuter) - Swedish election winner Ingvar
    Carlsson took the first steps toward forming a minority cabinet
    Monday, saying he would seek a ``government of cooperation.''
             Carlsson, whose Social Democratic Party (SDP) won Sunday's
    general election, was speaking after Prime Minister Carl Bildt
    handed in his center-right coalition government's resignation to
    the speaker of parliament.
             Bildt's coalition won just 147 seats in the 349-seat
    parliament, far short of the 175 needed to govern. Carlsson's
    SDP won 162 seats, 13 short of a majority.
             ``My aim is to build an effective government of
    cooperation,'' said Carlsson, indicating he would seek approval
    for legislation from a variety of potential partners before the
    cabinet needed to be voted upon in parliament.
             Carlsson could seek support from either of two leftist
    parties -- the Green and the Left parties -- or from the
    centrist Liberal Party he had earlier hoped might join in
    forming a permanent coalition.
             The 59-year-old Carlsson, prime minister from 1986 to 1991
    before being ousted by Bildt, said he would meet the speaker of
    parliament again Monday evening after she had met other
    political party leaders.
             He named solving the country's economic ills and driving the
    country's application for European Union (EU) membership as his
    two main tasks. Swedes will vote on November 13 on membership.
             Carlsson named a team of advisers who would be responsible
    for organizing the transition of power to a Social Democratic
    government.
             Leftist parties have declared they are ready to cooperate
    with the center-left SDP but Carlsson has said he would prefer
    to cooperate with the centrist Liberal Party.
             The election results showed a strong swing to the left
    across the country, but Bildt said after handing in his
    resignation that the shift was tactical rather than ideological.
             ``They were protest votes rather than an ideological
    movement to the left,'' he told reporters.
             The 45-year-old conservative, whose moderate monetarist
    policies proved too dry for Swedish voters, warned Carlsson that
    the shift to the left would not provide any answers to Sweden's
    pressing economic problems.
             Financial markets agreed Monday and marked down shares,
    bonds and the Swedish crown, although the fall was controlled
    and not as drastic as some market players had expected.