HELSINKI: Swedes have been scratching their heads and ridiculing President Donald Trump’s remarks that suggested a major incident had happened in the Scandinavian country.

During a rally in Florida on Saturday, Trump said “look what’s happening last night in Sweden” as he alluded to past terror attacks in Europe. It wasn’t clear what he was referring to and there were no high-profile situations reported in Sweden on Friday night.

The comment prompted a barrage of social media reaction on Sunday, with hundreds of tweets, and a local newspaper published a list of events that happened on Friday that appeared to have no connections to any terror-like activity.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Catarina Axelsson said that the government wasn’t aware of any “terror-linked major incidents.”

Former Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt tweeted, “Sweden? Terror attack? What has he been smoking? Questions abound.” The Aftonbladet tabloid addressed Trump in an article on Sunday, “This happened in Sweden Friday night, Mr President,” and listed in English some events that had happened in Sweden, including a man being treated for severe burns, an avalanche warning and police chasing a drunken driver.

Sweden, which has a long reputation for welcoming refugees and migrants, had a record 163,000 asylum applications in 2015 and it has since cut back on the number it annually accepts. Its most recent attack was in the capital, Stockholm, in December 2010, when an Iraqi-born Swede detonated two devices, including one that killed him but no one else.

Over the past few weeks, Trump counselor Kellyanne Conway has also referred to a “Bowling Green Massacre” that never occurred, and she was caught up in a public feud with CNN.

Published in Dawn, February 20th , 2017