Anders Hogstrom, Suspect In Auschwitz Sign Theft, Arrested In Sweden

STOCKHOLM — Swedish police on Thursday arrested a former neo-Nazi leader that Polish investigators suspect of being involved in the theft of the "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign at Auschwitz.

Swedish Prosecutor Agneta Hilding Qvarnstrom said 34-year-old Anders Hogstrom was detained in Stockholm on a European arrest warrant.

Hilding Qvarnstrom said Hogstrom will be appointed a defense lawyer and questioned by Swedish investigators before authorities can decide on extraditing him to Poland.

Polish officials have said Hogstrom is suspected of incitement to commit theft of a cultural treasure.

The infamous sign – which means "Work Sets You Free" in German – was stolen in December from the site of the Nazis' former Auschwitz death camp in Poland. Polish police found it in the woods three days later cut up into three pieces and charged five Polish men with its theft.

The Polish prosecutor has said he has evidence that Hogstrom visited Auschwitz with two Poles last spring and told them to steal the sign.

Experts on Sweden's extreme-right say Hogstrom founded and led the Swedish neo-Nazi group National Socialist Front in the 1990s. During that time he helped organize yearly celebrations of Adolf Hitler's birthday and advocated repatriation of refugees to their home countries, according to Expo, a research foundation that has mapped right-wing extremists.

However, Expo said he left National Socialist Front in 1999 after two of its members were convicted of a high-profile police murder, and he then became an active opponent of the extreme right.

Hogstrom has reportedly given conflicting information about his alleged role in the theft.

The Tabloid Aftonbladet quoted Hogstrom as saying he was acting as a middleman between the Polish thieves and an English-speaking buyer. But in a video clip posted Jan. 9 on the Web site of another tabloid, Expressen, Hogstrom said he had simply been tipped off about the theft and tried to stop it.

The Auschwitz sign is one of the most well-known slogans for Nazi Germany's atrocities during World War II and the Holocaust.

Between 1940 and 1945 more than 1 million people, mostly Jews, were killed in the gas chambers of Auschwitz-Birkenau or died of starvation or disease while forced to perform hard physical labor at the camp.

Comments

[robmclaughjr]

10:21 AM on 02/12/2010

Send him to Gitmo. He can get released when the others are, never.

[Oleg1]

12:29 PM on 02/12/2010

Comment disconnected from reality....

[mudshark12]

02:28 AM on 02/12/2010

I hope when Angers Hogstrom is sentenced, he get 10 years (or more) of hard labor so he will have the chance to ponder weather "Arbeit Macht Frei".

[Oleg1]

12:29 PM on 02/12/2010

LOL

[Gaylord P Farqua]

11:47 PM on 02/11/2010

If you ever have the opportunity to meet a survivor of that horror they will exhibit little or no surprise at this insensitive behavior. After liberation Jews returning to their homes in Poland after inconceivable suffering were brutalized by their former Polish neighbors who coveted their homes, businesses and farms.Hundreds were murdered. There were some extraordinary examples of Polish heroes who helped Jews and others escape the Nazis and in some cases actually hid them at the risk of their own lives and the lives of their families. Regretfully, these wonderful people were very few in number. If you visit Poland please go to Auschwitz and see for yourself what Fascism is capable of and perhaps you will get a new appreciation of what we have in this country and what we risk if we listen to some of the fools whom we suffer today.

[Thabit]

12:05 AM on 02/12/2010

And can we go to Gaza after to see the modern day form of this

[ask0]

06:16 AM on 02/12/2010

fanned

[Gaylord P Farqua]

08:06 AM on 02/12/2010

Gaza is perhaps the one of the worst examples of needless human suffering in the world today but hardly the same once you have seen the crematoriums. The tragedy these humans beings live each day is the product of the clash of culturesand religions, and the end of colonialism all at one time that produced the history of the region. So much has happened in the last sixty plus years to prevent the resolution of the differences between the people of the area that three generations have have been unable to stop the violence and reach a lasting accord. You can find enough blame to go around between the opposing parties but one thing is quite clear. In all the years since partition of Palestine and the creation of Israel, oil rich Muslim nations have stood by and allowed their brothers to live in inhuman conditions rather than parting with a few billion and building a positive infrastructure they have been satisfied with smuggling in arms and more recently missiles in to kill Israelis. Everything aside no one can justify zealots who will persuade a young man or woman to strap on a bomb designed to kill other human beings. Certainly not Allah.

[EuroMom]

11:54 AM on 02/12/2010

And those who do not have the opportunity of meeting such a person should be required to sit through all nine hours of Claude Lanzmann's film Sh0ah.

[Rock Brasiliano]

09:42 PM on 02/11/2010

We used to call Swedes Germans in human form.......

[loutreverte]

10:09 PM on 02/11/2010

Wow, a crass dehumanising statement. How clever of you.

[EuroMom]

09:43 AM on 02/12/2010

I don't think that went down very well, Rock. You might want to consider why.

[WilliamL]

04:26 PM on 02/11/2010

Most sensible people recognized it was most likely Neos behind this theft and not some metal thieves looking to make a few dollars.

[KIVPossum]

03:21 PM on 02/11/2010

I hope they nail him to the dirt. Some things belong to the world - that sign is one of them.

[magibrotherhood]

03:35 PM on 02/11/2010

Why ?...it`s an obnoxious symbol of Totalitarian Tyrrany .

[EuroMom]

04:58 PM on 02/11/2010

No -- it is a reminder and a warning to us all

[KIVPossum]

05:25 PM on 02/11/2010

Yes, absolute a symbol of tyranny. But not obnoxious, or not in the sense that we need it, the world needs it, as a constant reminder of the horrors.

[Moshe]

02:54 PM on 02/11/2010

How very sad that people like this still walk among us.

Authoritarianism is a mental illness shared by neo-nazis and neo-conservatives.

The difference between the two is that the neo-nazis are just more honest and open about their racist hatred.

[abbeysbooks]

05:09 PM on 02/11/2010

Read Robert Altemeyer's The Authoritarians for his life's work in experimental questionaires on the psychology behind authoritarianism. Available as an ebook or on lulu.com. Just google his website to read it.

[Moshe]

05:26 PM on 02/11/2010

Great suggestion. Thanks.

Shalom friend.

[CPAwADD]

10:10 PM on 02/11/2010

Escape from Freedom by Erich Fromm is another good read.

[loutreverte]

05:41 PM on 02/11/2010

"Authoritarianism is a mental illness"

Not at all, authoritarianism is the sum of individual choices people make as autonomous moral agents. Illnesses are usually beyond people's control and even when behaviours like smoking contribute, strike randomly.

Blaming violence on "mental illness" is just a new politically correct spin on the left (which I say as a proud liberal) to absolve ideologies of any blame. Check out almost any article on religious violence on HuffPo and I guarantee multiple posts attributing it in one way or another to 'crazy' people.

This mainly serves as a shield to fundamentalist religious beliefs for scrutiny as to how they actively justify violence.

[Moshe]

06:55 PM on 02/11/2010

We don't have to pick one or the other.

Authoritarians can be both evil and mentally ill.

In the most extreme examples, both clearly apply, i.e. moral psychologically healthy people do not choose to engage in the horrors of genocide.

Those that engage in genocide are both sick and evil.

[Balzac]

02:35 PM on 02/11/2010

Good police work.

[whatthel]

03:19 PM on 02/11/2010

I'm very glad he was caught.

[Talossa]

11:23 PM on 02/11/2010

He needs to be subjected to Sonderbehandlung.

[Trance2010]

02:31 PM on 02/11/2010

He can always claim suffering from alcoholism.

[Oleg1]

02:22 PM on 02/11/2010

Legal defense strategy suggestions to Hogstorm ( an appropriate name if I ever heard one) --
1. Environmental Defense--" I was just trying to prevent global warming by recycling metal."
Hey in Sweden that will fly.
2. If that fails--- claim that the sign is fake and you saw "Made in W. Bank" mark on it, in Hebrew.
Then apply for political asylum in Iran and a guaranteed professorship job at Tehran university.

[EuroMom]

05:01 PM on 02/11/2010

I find your making light of the theft of this important symbol in such a flippant way pretty offensive.

[wdw505]

05:55 PM on 02/11/2010

oh get over it..........

[Oleg1]

07:26 PM on 02/11/2010

Humor is the best way to deal with adversity and traumatic subjects. It is for this reason the best comedians in American are J.e.wish and African American,, in that order. And Europe, certainly Russians and Poles have the best humor.
It is the dour and humorless that create most of world's problems.
Regardless, it's fun ridiculing the guy with name like Hogstrom.

[Thabit]

12:09 AM on 02/12/2010

Now that they are caught can Israel Find the ones that burned the Mosque on the west bank ,.... burned Qurans....... painted swastikas on the walls . I would think the Israelis are just as eager to imprison who ever did that too

[LMPE]

02:16 PM on 02/11/2010

I hope that they deal with this creep to the full extent.

[Ira7]

02:04 PM on 02/11/2010

Well, I guess all of us who thought it was stolen just for the value of the metal have egg on our faces.

[loutreverte]

06:01 PM on 02/11/2010

You sure do.