2008-12-29 Syrjintää Ruotsissa: Migration Board pays off pro-Israel employee

[stjohan]

Sweden's Migration Board has elected to pay over a million kronor in compensation to a demoted employee who maintained a pro-Israeli blog instead of following a court order to reinstate him.


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A ruling handed down by the district court in Mölndal in western Sweden on November 11th found in favour of 51-year-old employee Lennart Eriksson. The court ruled that the demotion was tantamount to having Eriksson fired without cause, and therefore violated Swedish employment law.

Eriksson said at the time that he was looking forward to getting back to work.

But in a reply to Ericsson's lawyers dated December 19th the Migration Board has stated that it does not intend to follow the court order and will instead pay 1,203,200 kronor ($155,000) in compensation to Ericsson - the equivalent of 32 months salary. The board writes that the sum is in accordance with Swedish employment law.

"With this payment all dealings between the Migration Board and Eriksson will be settled. The Migration Board rejects all other demands made to date or in the future."

The sum will be paid to Eriksson on January 12th 2009.

Lennart Eriksson has responded on his blog by arguing that he is not interested in the board's "Judas money" and instead wants the board to follow the court ruling and reinstate him.

"I want the Migration Board to be a democratic authority. An authority where the 'justice-seeking general public' can expect fair and just treatment."

The case dates back to February when Eriksson decided to sue his employer when he returned from a year's sabbatical to find that he had been demoted from his job as the head of an asylum assessment unit, a position he had held for six years.

Ericsson was from the outset suspicious of the grounds on which the Migration Board had justified the move, believing that it had to do with a new supervisor's disapproval of a pro-Israeli blog Eriksson maintains in his spare time.

"I want to defend freedom and democracy. I try to be humble and just. Therefore I must - as every good democrat must - defend Israel," Eriksson wrote on his blog Sapere aude!

The case sparked more controversy when Migration Board lawyer Staffan Opitz criticized Eriksson during the trial for writing in his blog that Hamas-founder Ahmed Yassin was a terrorist, rather than a "Palestinian freedom fighter", despite the fact that the Swedish government considered Hamas a terrorist organization.

"It's quite remarkable, and that probably gets to the heart of matter. If the Migration Board has managers that believe that, I can understand that they don't like me," Eriksson said.

The court left aside the question of whether the move to demote him constituted a violation of his freedom of speech, addressing only whether the board was right to do so according to employment law.

The Local tried without success to contact the Migration Board for a comment on the compensation payment.

Peter Vinthagen Simpson (news@thelocal.se/+46 8 656 6518)

http://www.thelocal.se/16614/20081229/

[Ant.]

Tämä oli tosiaan uutinen. Työntekijä oli vapaa-aikanaan pitämässään blogissa kuvannut Hamasin perustajaa terroristiksi. Siis maassa, jossa valtio on itse nimennyt Hamasin terroristijärjestöksi.

Ilmeisesti tästä oli sitten poltettu päreet ja työntekijä oli erotettu. Ja kun oikeus määräsi irtisanomisen laittomaksi, yritetään työntekijä silti erottaa erorahojen turvin.

Näistä suvaitsevaisuusorganisaatioista on tulossa itsenäisiä toimijoita, jotka vähät piittaavat laista. Väärinajattelijat savutetaan pihalle. Jopa jostain Hamasista saa olla vain yhtä mieltä. Kuinkahan laajalle tämä on jo Suomessa levinnyt? Onko esimerkiksi yliopistossa mahdollista pitää työpaikkaansa, jos pitää maahanmuuttokriittistä blogia, on ei-vasemmistolaisen puolueen ehdokkaana tai tukee Israelia?

Kaikkein ongelmallisinta on, ettei näitä viher-vasemmiston inkvisiittoreita eroteta. He ja heidän mielivaltainen linjansa ovat kaiken kritiikin ulkopuolella.

[kohmelo]

http://www.thelocal.se/22340/20090928/

Migration Board firing of pro- Israel blogger 'violated constitution'
Sweden's Parliamentary Ombudsman (Justitieombudsmannen - JO) has rapped the Migration Board (Migrationsverket) over its controversial reassignment of Lennart Eriksson, an employee who had voiced pro-Israeli opinions on his personal blog.

The action taken against Eriksson constituted a violation of his freedom of speech – and freedom of opinion, according to the Ombudsman.

"The constitutional protection of freedom of speech means that, amongst other things, the public may not take action against any individual who has exercised their freedom of speech. There are no grounds for an exception in this case," the Ombudsman wrote...