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NATO process Sweden's NATO membership

Putin: "Stupid" of Sweden to join NATO

It was "stupid" of Sweden and Finland to join NATO, according to Vladimir Putin. During a speech on Thursday, the Russian president said that the countries sacrificed "strategic advantages" that would have meant remaining militarily non-aligned.

- We have never had problems with Sweden, let alone with Finland.

Putin also said that the Kremlin "monitors the increased militarization in Europe" and that Russia will respond to what he calls a threat.

Search operation in Northern Norway - five soldiers missing

A search operation is underway in Finnmark in northern Norway after ten soldiers failed to return from an exercise, Norwegian media reports.

The soldiers were supposed to have returned at 7 a.m. on Thursday morning. The Armed Forces' press officer Brage Wiik-Hansen says that they are working on two different scenarios.

– Either the soldiers misunderstood the time of return, or something has happened. We must take into account that something has happened, he tells TV2.

At 7:45 p.m., it was announced that five soldiers had been found safe. Three arrived at an agreed meeting point and two were found in the search area.

– For these, the exercise has taken longer than planned, says task force leader Jørgen Haukland Hansen.

Danish fraud case

Danish response: Lawyer for 100,000 kronor per hour

After the Danish tax authority Skat lost the equivalent of 18 billion kronor in a British case, the authority has chosen to hire a British star lawyer, reports Børsen.

Skat has chosen to appeal the verdict from the High Court in London. If they are granted permission to do so, they will hire Lord David Pannick – the lawyer who is known for rejecting all assignments with a fee of less than 1 million pounds.

Lord Pannick's hourly rate is 10,000 pounds per hour, which is equivalent to 126,000 Swedish kronor per hour, according to the business newspaper.

Manchester synagogue attack

The knifeman is believed to have been carrying a fake explosive device

The suspected explosive device that the perpetrator carried in the attack on a synagogue in Manchester was likely a dummy, bomb expert Rick Rickard tells Sky News. According to Rickard, the purpose was probably to create fear.

He says that the device captured in the images is far too small to cause the kind of damage that a suicide bomber wants to achieve. Before the attack was carried out, the perpetrator appeared to be holding a phone, but Rickard sees it as out of the question that it was used to remotely trigger a bomb.

The device was later placed in an evidence bag by police.

– A bomb squad would never hand over something with explosive content to a forensic scientist, says the expert.

The perpetrator killed two people before he was shot dead by police.