The Swedish embassies in Bolivia, Liberia and Zimbabwe will be closed. The closure is expected to be completed in 2026, announced Minister for Development Cooperation and Foreign Affairs Benjamin Dousa at a press conference.
Aid to the three countries will be phased out by August 31 next year. In addition, aid to Tanzania and Mozambique will be phased out during the same period.
The announcement was made by Minister of Development Cooperation and Foreign Trade Benjamin Dousa at a press conference, where he also described it as the biggest change in development cooperation "ever in Sweden's history."
For too long, Swedish aid has been too scattered, it has been a water dispenser, he says.
The government has previously announced that the aid budget will be reduced from SEK 56 to 53 billion in 2026. It is also known that aid will be reprioritized to focus on Ukraine.
Increased support for Ukraine
According to Dousa, aid to Ukraine will increase to at least 10 billion kronor next year, which according to him is close to 20 percent of Sweden's total aid.
He says that Sweden must therefore prioritize, and that this is the last such priority.
The money has to come from somewhere to balance the budget, he says.
According to Benjamin Dousa, aid to some African countries has not always had the effect the government wanted. He believes that the aid has sometimes been downright harmful.
In the name of honesty, let's be blunt about the fact that several countries, especially in Africa, have built in a dependency on aid, which may have led to them not reforming themselves as much as we would have liked to see.
But he also admits that much of the aid that is now being withdrawn has been important to many people in the various countries.
Our task is to make the tough decisions needed to be able to provide more resources to Ukraine, he says.
UN warned
The US has made dramatic cuts in aid in the past year and the UN has warned that many people in Africa are missing out on HIV prevention efforts.
According to Benjamin Dousa, however, there is a difference between the Swedish turnaround in aid policy and the cuts that the US made this spring.
We continue to be very large donors to the humanitarian system, from aid to AIDS prevention and other important health interventions, things that literally save lives. That will not be affected by this.
