The majority of Swedes say that the country should not admit such a large number of foreigners, a recent survey found.

The multicultural project peaked in 2015, when 163 000 migrants sought asylum in Sweden.The decades of open borders have produced a deeply divided society with a host of problems that did not exist in the past, writes the Swedish news portal Samnytt, noting, for example, the infiltration of clans and mafia-like groups at all levels of society, and parallel societies that have little to do with Sweden, Swedish law and culture.

A new survey by Ipsos has found that just over half of Swedes, 56 percent, say they would like to see a reduction in the number of migrants coming to Sweden. Only 12 percent would like to take in more migrants.

Views on immigration vary considerably between supporters of different parties. Among Green Party and Left Party voters, the majority want to take in more people, while opposition is the strongest among Sweden Democrats, Christian Democrats and conservative voters.

There is also a gender divide, with more men saying they want to take in fewer migrants, and an education divide, with more people with higher education and those living in big cities wanting to admit more people.

In November, fresh statistics released by OECD showed that Sweden is the most generous country in Europe in granting citizenship to immigrants.

In 2023, 67 789 immigrants were granted Swedish citizenship compared to 12 000 in Finland and 5 000 in Denmark.

Jimmie Akesson, leader of the Sweden Democrats, has called for a total stop to the mass issuance of Swedish citizenship, which the government has not abandoned despite the pledge of a „paradigm shift” in immigration policy.

Akesson pointed out that the previous governments pursued a „totally insane policy” and that Swedish citizenship has largely been granted to „individuals from deeply dysfunctional countries where values are often completely different from those that characterise our Swedish culture”.

The Swedish government has recently tightened requirements for obtaining Swedish citizenship. These include the command of the Swedish language, understanding and respecting Swedish democratic values, and self-sufficiency. Additional requirements include the conduct of a decent lifestyle, and the period of residence in Sweden before applying for citizenship has been extended from the current five to at least eight years.