Sweden freezes over a billion euros in Libyan assets

(STOCKHOLM) - Sweden said Wednesday its financial institutions had so far frozen more than one billion euros in line with European Union sanctions against the regime of Libyan strongman Moamer Kadhafi.

"According to the EU's sanction regulation ... with regards to the situation in Libya, Swedish financial companies have reported to the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority having together frozen more than 10 billion kronor (1.12 billion euros, 1.56 billion dollars) so far," the country's financial regulator said in a statement.

The regulator said it could not, because of privacy rules, specify how much each company had frozen or which companies and people were involved.

Earlier this month, the 27 nations of the EU decided to impose tough new sanctions on the Kadhafi's regime, notably on the Libyan Investment Authority (LIA), the overseas investment vehicle for Tripoli's oil revenues.

Set up in 2006, the LIA has significant holdings in Italian bank UniCredit, Italian defence and aeronautical group Finmeccanica, Juventus Football Club and Pearson, the publisher of the Financial Times, which itself froze that holding at the beginning of March.

Swedish public radio (SR) reported Wednesday one of the companies the LIA had invested in was Swedish aluminium company Kubal.

SR and daily Dagens Nyheter recalled that a mosque in the southern Swedish city of Malmoe and research at the renowed Uppsala University had reportedly been financed by Libyan funds.