Swedish election ‘not a priority’ for Moscow interference but still a target for troll farms and disinformation

As Sweden prepares to vote on Sunday (13 September), the country is facing a threat that has become familiar across Europe: attempts by Russia to exploit political divisions and undermine trust in institutions. Swedish authorities are taking the possibility seriously. The government in Stockholm has pointed to the current security environment, technological change and experience from elections elsewhere in Europe as reasons to strengthen the country’s resilience against foreign malign information influence. “All authorities who work with cyberthreats work together, cooperating with us at the Election Authority and helping us secure the IT system,” the Election Authority’s chief executive, Anna Nyqvist, told Radio Sweden. In February, the Swedish Military Intelligence and Security Service (MUST) published its annual assessment for 2025. The report warned that Russia was using hybrid methods against EU and Nato countries and was prioritising measures to strengthen its military capabilities in the region. But the picture is more nuanced. The Agency for Psychological Defence, the Swedish government and the Swedish Security Service have said that Sweden and Swedish elections “are not currently a priority target for Russian information influence”. At the same time, they stress that the elections “take place in a serious security situation”, marked by “great uncertainty”. “Sweden is not seen as a high level of priority from Russia,” Patrik Oksanen, an expert at the foreign and security policy think-tank Frivärld, told EUobserver. “Russia has other priorities.” This view is also shared by Ola Svenonius of the Swedish Defence Research Agency. “Ahead of the elections, Swedish authorities estimated that Russia’s main goal would not be to influence the Swedish elections. Russia is preoccupied with other countries and Sweden has a sufficiently high resilience,” Svenonius told EUobserver. “The cost would be too high with regards to the rewards.” Russia’s interest in weakening western institutions is not necessarily expressed through a single, spectacular attempt to manipulate an election. Much of the work is slower: cultivating distrust, amplifying existing grievances and pushing narratives into the information environment in the hope that they will eventually gain traction. “If we are talking about broader Russian influence efforts, the aim is to take down trust in society – to undermine trust in the media, politicians, authorities,” Oksanen said. Sweden not the priority Although Sweden has been targeted by Russian activity, it is not currently a priority. “Russia has not the forces to make everything a priority the whole time,” Oksanen said. That does not mean Sweden is irrelevant. In August, Swedish public broadcaster SVT reported that a pro-Russian troll network, active mostly on X, had circulated fabricated videos and false allegations of electoral fraud, including accusations aimed at prime minister Ulf Kristersson. The disinformation campaign was linked to the pro-Russian influence operation known as Matryoshka. Also last month, the Swedish government said a Russian intelligence operation had been uncovered in the country, including the recruitment of an agent from another country’s embassy in Sweden, according to SVT. The government said the operation was not specifically connected to the September election but formed part of a broader pattern in which Russia works strategically and over the long term. MUST has also warned that Russia is conducting advanced hybrid warfare against Nato countries, including Sweden. Its chief, Thomas Nilsson, told SVT that Russia wants to “make us insecure”, “split us” and make western countries stop supporting Ukraine. That objective is hardly a secret. “Russia remains the most significant, direct, and long-term threat,” states the Gdańsk declaration from June, in which Sweden and other eastern-flank countries said Russia and its proxies were conducting persistent hybrid and foreign-information-manipulation campaigns designed to undermine unity, democratic values and support for Ukraine. Sweden’s proportional electoral system also means that the political landscape is different from countries where a single electoral contest can determine who forms a government. More importantly for Moscow, Sweden’s broad political consensus on support for Ukraine leaves Russia with limited room to exploit the issue electorally. All parties in parliament today, from the populist left to the populist right, support Sweden’s backing for Ukraine. “The soil is not very fertile for splitting Swedish politics on the issue of Ukraine,” Oksanen said. London, Paris and Berlin are the targets