RUNNING a human-rights-oriented foreign policy is a challenge, even for the Swedes. In October Sweden became the first Western government to recognize the state of Palestine. Margot Wallstrom, the foreign minister, was duly invited to address a meeting of the Arab League on March 9th. Ms Wallstrom wrote a rather anodyne speech exhorting the member states to live up to their commitments on human rights, particularly women’s rights. Saudi Arabia objected, and the league blocked her from speaking. Now Sweden’s relations with much of the Arab world are in shambles.
The speech was not the only trigger for the falling-out. On March 10th the Swedish government said it would revoke a weapons export agreement with Saudi Arabia that had been in place since 2005. Stefan Lofven, the Social Democrat prime minister, had been under pressure from his coalition partners in the Green Party to end the agreement, but the timing could not have been worse. The same day, the Saudis recalled their ambassador to Stockholm, and the Arab League publicly condemned Ms Wallstrom’s cancelled speech, calling it an offense to Saudi Arabia and to Islam. In the following weeks, the United Arab Emirates recalled its ambassador, and Saudi Arabia said it would neither issue new business visas to Swedes nor renew the visas of those living in the kingdom.
The standoff has serious…
