Salwan Momika, an Iraqi atheist anti-Islam activist who sparked outrage by staging Quran-burning protests in Sweden in 2023, has been shot dead, according to Stockholm police.

A spokesperson for Sweden’s prosecutor’s office confirmed that Momika was shot dead in capital city Stockholm on Wednesday.

Momika, who was due Thursday to be handed a verdict in a trial where he was accused of incitement to racial hatred had arrived as a refugee in Sweden from his native Iraq in 2018.He was reportedly streaming live on TikTok at the time he was shot. 

The 38-year-old had claimed he carried out the demonstrations because he believed the Quran “should be banned in the world because of the danger it causes to democracy, ethics, human values, human rights, and women’s rights. It just doesn’t work in this time and age.”

A Stockholm court dismissed the case against Momika after his death. It said the verdict for another man in the same criminal trial over “offences of agitation against an ethnic or national group” would be postponed until Monday.

Ulf Kristersson, the Swedish prime minister, told reporters there were fears the killing could have been linked to another country. “I can assure you that the security services are deeply involved because there is obviously a risk that there is a connection to a foreign power,” he said.

The deputy prime minister, Ebba Busch, condemned the murder. “It is a threat to our free democracy. It must be met with the full force of our society,” she wrote on X.

The security service said police were leading the investigation but “we are following the development of events closely to see what impact this may have on Swedish security”.