STOCKHOLM (AP) — Sweden is investigating a sanctioned tanker that is suspected of being part of the sanctioned Russian “shadow fleet,” according to the Scandinavian country's civil defense minister.
The Swedish Coast Guard said it boarded and detained the Jin Hui on Sunday on suspicion of flying a false flag while transiting Swedish waters.
The vessel was sailing through the Baltic Sea under a Syrian flag, the coast guard said in a statement. There are also concerns about the vessel’s seaworthiness.
The Jin Hui — which remained anchored off Trelleborg on Monday — is currently on European Union, U.K. and Ukraine sanctions lists, Sweden's Civil Defense Minister Carl-Oskar Bohlin wrote on X.
The ship’s captain, a Chinese citizen, was arrested on suspicion of using a false document and other offenses, Swedish prosecutors said Monday.
It is the fifth vessel seizure by Sweden's coast guard in recent weeks.
“Ships with suspected deficiencies in their seaworthiness continue to sail in Swedish waters,” said Daniel Stenling, the coast guard's deputy chief of operations. “This is not acceptable. We have intervened before, now we are intervening again.”
Russia's ambassador to Sweden, Sergey Belyaev, said in a statement Wednesday that the Jin Hui is not operating under the Russian flag, and said Swedish authorities told the embassy there were no Russians on board.
The statement did not directly address the allegation regarding the shadow fleet.
Sweden last year said it would step up insurance checks on foreign ships, aimed at tightening controls on Russian vessels suspected of transporting oil and gas or carrying stolen Ukrainian grain.
The Swedish Coast Guard, together with Swedish Police, boards the Jin Hui, a tanker sailing under a suspected false flag in the Baltic Sea, Sunday, May 3, 2026. (Swedish Coast Guard via AP)
MAGDEBURG, Germany (AP) — The far-right Alternative for Germany was projected to win a strong victory in a regional election Sunday, but it wasn’t immediately clear whether it would be able to fulfill its ambition of forming the country’s first far-right state government since World War II.
The party of German's unpopular leader, Chancellor Friedrich Merz, was set for a disastrous result in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. The anti-migration and Russia-friendly Alternative for Germany's candidate for governor said that “we have written history.”
Ulrich Siegmund, 35, told public broadcaster ARD that voters had sent a signal that “things cannot carry on like this” and that it was “also a signal toward Berlin.” Of Germany’s unpopular leader, he said: “A very good campaigner for us in this election campaign was Friedrich Merz. Every day this man is in the chancellery is one too many.”
Alternative for Germany, or AfD, went into the vote seeking an absolute majority in the state legislature to govern on its own. That would overcome the so-called firewall of mainstream parties’ refusal to work with AfD, but it was unclear long after polls closed whether it would happen.
A first state government would be the biggest prize in the anti-migration party’s 13-year history, at a time of widespread discontent with a national government that has yet to persuade voters that it can get the country’s sluggish economy moving.
Whether or not AfD can form a government, the projected result is a blow to Merz, whose center-right party has led Saxony-Anhalt for 24 years. Unlike other countries in Europe, modern Germany hasn't yet had a far-right or right-wing populist party leading a national, state or major-city government.
AfD is the biggest opposition party in Germany’s national parliament and is strongest in the formerly communist and less prosperous east, where Saxony-Anhalt is located.
Its regional branch in Saxony-Anhalt is one of several classified as Its regional branch in Saxony-Anhalt is one of several classified as a proven right-wing extremist group by the domestic intelligence agency, which points to members' denigration of migrants from Muslim countries among other things.
The party talks of “remigration,” a politically charged term for the deportation of immigrants. Its leader in a neighboring state appealed two convictions for knowingly using a Nazi slogan.
AfD vehemently rejects accusations of extremism and says they're politically motivated.
Projections for ARD and ZDF public television, based on exit polls and partial counting, put AfD at a bit over 44% of the vote, more than double its showing five years ago in the region of 2.1 million people west of Berlin.
That was far ahead of Merz's Christian Democratic Union which was seen polling 18% and losing about half its support. The Left Party, the center-left Social Democrats and Greens were seen taking around 9% each.
It was unclear whether the BSW party would get the 5% of the vote needed to win seats. The projections put AfD at least marginally short of an absolute majority, though that could change.
AfD's national co-leader, Alice Weidel, described the projected result as “sensational” and said that “we have received a very clear mandate to govern here.” The party's “hand is outstretched to all who want to make Saxony-Anhalt better and move Germany forward,” she said.
A visibly disappointed incumbent governor, Sven Schulze, congratulated AfD on becoming the state's strongest political force and said that “we as the CDU will also have to deal with this result,” without specifying how.
Franziska Hoppermann, the national general-secretary of Merz's party, rejected the idea of backing off its refusal to deal with AfD.
“AfD is a right-wing extremist party. It wants to leave the euro; that would be economic downfall ... it works closely together with Russia, it wants a completely different social model,” she said. “We will not work with them.”
There already has been one case in which AfD won a state election but didn’t end up governing. That was two years ago in neighboring Thuringia, where a CDU governor took power with a minority government, but against a regional AfD that was well short of a majority.
If the result allows Schulze to try to put together some kind of alliance with smaller parties, that would be delicate, because it would require at least some tacit support from the Left Party, a hard-left party with which the CDU refuses to form coalitions.
Germany’s 16 states have extensive powers, for example in overseeing security matters and running the education system.
Siegmund has listed among his top priorities “a deportation offensive” and dropping incentives for people to come to Germany and “exploit our social system.” He wants to initiate a long process to withdraw Saxony-Anhalt from the regional public broadcaster, citing concerns about “disinformation.”
AfD in Saxony-Anhalt wants to allow home schooling, which so far isn’t permitted in Germany. It pledges to ban schools from officially raising the rainbow flag and ensure they fly the national flag. It opposes taxpayers’ money being “given away” to Ukraine and says it would push to lift sanctions against Russia, but that isn’t a matter state governments can decide.
State governments also sit in Germany's upper house of parliament, which has to approve some government legislation. The influence there of Saxony-Anhalt, one of the smaller states in a nation of 83.5 people, is limited — it controls four of the 69 votes.
Geir Moulson reported from Berlin.
After the projections for the state election in Saxony-Anhalt were released, members of various coalitions protested against the AfD on the Römer, holding a sign that read "Anti-social, fascist, stupid!!!", in Frankfurt, Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (Boris Roessler/dpa via AP)
Top candidate Ulrich Siegmund shows thumbs up beside party leaders Tino Chrupalla and Alice Weidel, from left, at an election party of the "Alternative for Germany" (AfD) after the Saxony-Anhalt state elections in Magdeburg, eastern Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Party members celebrate with a sign of AfD top candidate Ulrich Siegmund after the first results at an election party of the "Alternative for Germany" (AfD) after the Saxony-Anhalt state elections in Magdeburg, eastern Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Ulrich Siegmund, center, lead candidate and co-chair of the AfD state parliamentary group in Saxony-Anhalt, celebrates with Alice Weidel, federal chairwoman and co-chair of the AfD parliamentary group in the Bundestag, and Tino Chrupalla, federal chairman and co-chair of the AfD parliamentary group in the Bundestag, after the first results at an election party of the "Alternative for Germany" (AfD) after the Saxony-Anhalt state elections in Magdeburg, eastern Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (Michael Kappeler/dpa via AP)
German Chancellor and Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party leader Friedrich Merz, left, and Saxony-Anhalt State Governor and top candidate Sven Schulze give a press statement after visiting UPM Biochemicals in Leuna, Germany, Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Ulrich Siegmund, top candidate for the "Alternative for Germany" (AfD) party and his wife Julia leaving a polling station on a small Schwalbe motorcycle after voting during the Saxony-Anhalt state elections in Tangermuende, eastern Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Ulrich Siegmund, top candidate for the "Alternative for Germany" (AfD) party votes at a polling station during the Saxony-Anhalt state elections in Tangermuende, eastern Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
Sven Schulze, Minister-President of Saxony-Anhalt and state chairman of the CDU in Saxony-Anhalt, drops his ballot into the ballot box during the Saxony-Anhalt state election, in Magdeburg, Germany, Sunday Sept. 6, 2026. At left is his wife Kati Schulze. (Klaus-Dietmar Gabbert/dpa via AP)
Ulrich Siegmund, top candidate for the "Alternative for Germany" (AfD) party how's his motorcycle keys in party coolers after voting at a polling station during the Saxony-Anhalt state elections in Tangermuende, eastern Germany, Sunday, Sept. 6, 2026. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)
