Swedish authorities warn Ukrainian female refugees not to dress in a way that could provoke Muslim men

Ukrainian women at the Galaxen refugee centre in Olofström, Sweden, have been advised not to dress in a way that would provoke males from ‘other cultures’ who also live at the Galaxen accommodation facility, as per the Swedish online publication Nyheter Idag.

In response to the ‘advice’ from the refugee housing administration, Gitana Bengtsson, who has been assisting refugees, made sure to connect with a women’s shelter and said, ‘I have talked to a woman from the women’s shelter in Olofström. She said that we should go there and have an informative meeting for the women. So that if they feel unsafe, they can call, and they should feel safe. Tell them a little about their rights and where they can turn’.

Bengtsson explained how Ukrainian ladies dressed before being instructed to alter, ‘they usually dressed like us, you and me. There is nothing strange about it. They did not look like prostitutes. If those women lived in the city, no one would tell them how to dress’.

The women were apparently advised by the site manager at the accommodation not to wear light clothes that exposed body parts, such as short shorts or skirts. There have been several stories of Ukrainian women seeking asylum in Sweden feeling uncomfortable in their new surroundings as a result of migrant males attempting to break into their homes.

Following an incident in which foreign males invaded their homes and attempted to assault them, the Swedish news site Samnytt met with female Ukrainian immigrants living in the town of Orebro in March. ‘They said that Sweden was a safe country, but I have not seen that’, one of the women told Swedish public radio.

In addition to threats of sexual assault, a number of Ukrainians have allegedly refused to board buses bound for Sweden in Kyiv, citing general worries about the country’s crime rate.

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In a radio interview in March, Jimmy Hemmingsson, a Swedish national currently assisting the humanitarian effort in Warsaw, said that refugees had expressed concerns about the number of shootings that occur in Sweden, as well as hearing reports of social protection services taking children away.