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Fact check

Is it true: Olof Palme assassination (28 Feb 1986, Stockholm)?

Partially True3% confidence

Partly — it's more complicated than the claim suggests.

Olof Palme was shot dead in Stockholm on 28 Feb 1986. Christer Pettersson was convicted in 1989 but the conviction was overturned. The investigation was formally closed on 10 June 2020, with Chief Prosecutor Krister Petersson naming the late Stig Engström (the "Skandia man") as primary suspect. Engström died in 2000. Theories attributing the killing to SAPO, South African intelligence, or the CIA remain unproven.

The claim

Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme was shot dead on Sveavägen in central Stockholm on 28 February 1986 as he and his wife walked home from a cinema. The case was one of the longest unsolved political m

Key evidence

Killing confirmed — Palme died of gunshot wounds on Sveavägen

Stig Engström named as primary suspect in 2020 closure

Read the full evidence file

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