Quotes of the Day

Anna Lindh was a role model, a talented campaigner, and, when she was murdered last week, a martyr to the idea that political leaders should not be isolated from the public they serve. As Sweden's Foreign Minister, she was an eloquent proponent of openness and tolerance both within the European Union and on the world stage. She managed to combine a grueling work schedule and a rich family life with her husband and two sons, and her accessibility and rapport with voters made her Sweden's most popular politician, widely tipped as the next Prime Minister.

When Lindh left her office last week to shop at the landmark NK department store in downtown Stockholm, she was unaccompanied by bodyguards. As she browsed through the store, a man in a hooded jacket and baseball cap dashed up, chased her into the Filippa K boutique on the second floor and repeatedly stabbed her in the chest, stomach and arms. Lindh, 46, died the following day of massive internal bleeding. The murder left Sweden in shock. "The attack has dealt a blow to the society we have built and want to live in," Prime Minister Göran Persson said, fighting back tears. "Sweden has lost one of its foremost representatives, our face to the world."

"We have failed in our duty," said Kurt Malmström, acting head of Sweden's security agency, Säpo. "Such an event cannot be allowed to happen to a person under our protection." But until last week, the Prime Minister was the only politician with around-the-clock guards. It is a measure of Sweden's openness that Säpo believed at the time of the attack that Lindh did not require protection, even though she was the lead campaigner for a yes vote in the country's divisive euro referendum, her face smiling from posters throughout the country. Police identified the killer as a tall, disheveled man who may be deranged; they doubt the murder was politically motivated. "We still think we live in this safe, little world," says Anna Wramner Munkhammar, who works for Sweden in Europe, a pro-euro campaign organization. "We're all in shock."

And having déjà vu. In 1986, Prime Minister Olof Palme was gunned down outside a Stockholm cinema. His assassin was never caught. Lindh's murder has provoked the same soul searching that followed the Palme killing, as Swedes wonder whether their prized open society can survive in the 21st century. King Carl XVI Gustaf led hundreds of Swedes at a memorial service in Stockholm on Thursday. The king grieved for Lindh, but the country also mourned the loss of its self-image as a peaceful, harmonious corner of Europe.

• CHARLES P. WALLACE
• After the murder of Foreign Minister Anna Lindh, can Sweden's open society survive?