Stefan Torssell
Stefan Torssell (born 1946) is a Swedish sea captain, author, lecturer, politician, and reporter known for his book "M/S Estonia - svenska statens haveri"[1] which purports to reveal controversial information about the Swedish governmental cover up of the about the MS Estonia sinking. He also gave an interview about the book in Swebbtv.[2] Torssell is a writer at Nya Tider[3] and identifies himself as a soft nationalist and patriot.
Background
Torssell became a sailor at the age of 15 and graduated as a sea captain.[4] In his youth, he became a member of the Centre Party and later as one of the founders of Green Party in 1981. He left the party quickly with the motivation that they had a large distance to ordinary Swede. Today he believes that both Miljöpartiet and Left Party are opportunistic. According to Torssell, after the Swedish political establishment seized to serve the Swedish public he became a patriot and a soft nationalist. He was a writer at Avpixlat, but left the agency in the election of 2014 due to their political agenda. He continued as a columnist at Nya Tider which he believes is more liberal. He published five articles about MS Estonia.
MS Estonia
On September 27, 1994, MS Estonia left Tallinn with 989 passengers on board and in the night it wrecked in the Baltic Sea.[5] Shortly after the incident, Stefan Torssell was hired at the Swedish Maritime Administration and met the victims families and began investigating the event on his spare time. After publishing his book "M/S Estonia: svenska statens haveri" Torssell eventually participated in an interview with Swebbtv where he criticized the Swedish Government who at the time of the incident, in 1994, failed to respond properly to the emergency.[6] Torssell states in his book, wikt:transcribed from the audio recordings of the radio, that a large bang was heard and that the captain sounded an SOS-alarm to the Swedish and Finnish authorities that the ship was sinking. Torssell has hypothesized that the then Prime Minister Carl Bildt knew that Russian arms were on board, and that retrieving the ship would uncover possible secret and political scandals and chose to label it as an accident.[7] In 2015, Stefan Torssell arranged a lecture where he stated that after 15 hours of emergency, Carl Bildt stated that the reason of the wreck of Estonia was a "design flaw" on the side.[8] The committee he arranged for the investigation confirmed his theory. The Swedish government, with Mona Sahlin, chose to give the situation a "grave peace agreement" (gravfrid in Swedish) resulting in the errand being closed due to respect of the victims family members. The incident of Estonia has never been investigated publicly by a third party actor despite the United Nations resolution IMO A.849(20) about international sea crash investigations in paragraf 13 which states that all investigation must be re-opened against when new evidence are presented which opposes previous conclusion.[9] According to Henning Witte, a German-Swedish attorney who ran a special investigation of the incident, the ship was sunk as a result of an attack and Swedish authorities sought to cover it up. The investigation of Witte was supported by the families of the victims and survivors however the chief of Swedish committee investigating Estonia, Ann-Louise Eksborg, opposed any new evidence which contradicted the official theory.[10] Expressen published an article in 2008 by Torssell where he, along other deputies and reporters co-authoring, states that the public investigation of Estonia has been halted through oblivion, gags, pressure from state executives, classified reports, destroyed documents, edited records, video recordings and absence of responsibility.[11]
Politics
Stefan Torssell has criticized Alternative for Sweden (AFS) for their neutrality in the Palestina-Israel situation.[12] In April 2019 Torssell became elected as the party leader of Landsbygdspartiet Oberoende (LPO).[13]
References
- Torssell, Stefan (2016). M/S Estonia : svenska statens haverins haveri av Stefan Torssell (Book) (in Swedish) (Prcddh ed.). AlternaMedia. ISBN 9789198347807. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Willgert, Mikael. "Lördagsintervju 30 - Stefan Torssell om mörkläggningen av Estoniakatastrofen. (Stefan Torssell and the cover up of Estonia)". SwebbTV (in Swedish). Swebbtv. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Torssell, Stefan (2019). "Stefan Torssell - Kampanjandet mot alternativa medier (The campaign of alternative media)" (in Swedish). AlternaMedia AB. Fria Tider. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Hellertz, Pia (1904). M/S ESTONIA - Svenska statens haveri Av Stefan Torssell (2016) Pia Hellertz – den 28 september 2016 (PDF). Pia Hellertz. p. 3. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Hellertz, Pia. "M/S ESTONIA – Svenska statens haveri — Humanism & Kunskap (Estonia - the Swedish government failure)". humanismkunskap.org. Pia Hellertz. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Vaken.se (Awakened), Vaken.se (Awakened) (13 June 2019). "Stefan Torssell om mörkläggningen av Estonia (Stefan Torssell: The cover up of Estonia)". Vaken.se (Awakened) (in Swedish). Vaken.
- BLOMDAHL, ÅKE (6 September 2016). "Stefan Torssell söker sanningen om Estoniakatastrofen (Stefan Torssell seeks the truth about MS Estonia)" (in Swedish). Alterna Media. Alterna Media. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Torssell, Stefan. "Mörkläggningen kring Estoniakatastrofen – Ett föredrag med Stefan Torssell | Föreningen Cui Bono (The cover up of Estonia - lecture by Stefan Torssell)". Cui Bono (in Swedish). Cui Bono.
- Witte, Henning (1999). M/S ESTONIA SÄNKTES Nya fakta och teorier om ESTONIAGATE (Henning Witte: MS Estonia was attacked - new evidence) (PDF). Stockholm: Wittes förlag. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Fingalsson, Helen (15 October 2016). "På jakt efter sanningen (Hunting the truth)". Norra Skåne (in Swedish). NSK. NSK. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Stefan Torssell sjökapten, f d byrådirektör Sjöfartsverket, Per Björkman, advokat Henrik S Järrel journalist, f d riksdagsledamot (2008). "DEBATT: Sanningen om Estonia måste fram (Debate: The Truth about Estonia must come to light)". Aftonbladet (in Swedish). Expressen. Expressen. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Torssell, Stefan (22 June 2018). "Stefan Torssell: AfS talar med dubbla tungor om Israel (Stefan Torssell: AfS speaks with double tongues)" (in Swedish). Editors in chief: Mats Dagerlind, Egor Putilov, Kent Ekeroth, Simon Kristoffersson. Samnytt. Retrieved 19 June 2019.
- Johansson, Andreas (8 April 2019). "Torssell tar över på partiledarposten (Torssell takes over the party leader post)". www.vimmerbytidning.se. Editor in chief: Christoffer Nielsen and News executive: Jenn Hultberg. Vimmerby Tidning. Retrieved 19 June 2019.