Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has sharply criticized Spain’s plan to let undocumented migrants obtain residence permits, describing it as a very bad idea. The comments came on August 11, 2026, in the middle of Sweden’s election campaign.
DR reports that Kristersson, Sweden’s Liberal Conservative prime minister, attacked the decision taken earlier this year by the Spanish government under Social Democratic Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. The measure allows migrants staying illegally in Spain to apply for residence permits.
Kristersson made the remarks in an interview with the Financial Times. According to DR, he said the Spanish decision triggered strong reactions from several other European leaders at the most recent EU summit in Brussels. He argued that the program runs directly counter to what other member states are trying to achieve.
DR reports that around 1.2 million migrants have so far applied to be covered by the Spanish amnesty program. In recent years, EU countries have broadly tightened their policies toward migrants and refugees, most recently opening the door to sending rejected asylum seekers to return centers in countries outside the union. Spain’s government has positioned itself on a more liberal and open line than the Swedish or Danish governments, and Spanish Social Democrats in the European Parliament have previously called such centers inhumane and contrary to EU values.
Ceuta and the Swedish campaign
The criticism comes days after tens of thousands of migrants moved toward Ceuta, the Spanish enclave on the North African coast. Per DR, Kristersson was among the heads of government who quickly issued a sharp warning to Spain. Speaking to SVT, he said Spain’s Social Democratic government must not repeat the mistake made by Sweden’s Social Democrats in 2015.
Swedes go to the polls on September 13. DR notes that the 2015 refugee crisis, when more than 160,000 people, mainly from the Middle East, sought asylum in Sweden, still shapes Swedish politics. Sweden became one of the European countries receiving the most asylum seekers relative to its population.
Both the Social Democrats and the center-right parties have since tightened their migration policies significantly. In 2025, only 6,700 people applied for asylum in Sweden, the lowest figure in nearly 30 years, according to DR. Kristersson told the Financial Times that the situation in Ceuta proves that Europe must remain very cautious, and that he believes Spain understood the message.
Kristersson has repeatedly warned that parties further to the left, on whose seats the Social Democrats could depend, want a more open policy. The Social Democrats have called this a scare campaign. As reported by Expressen, party leader Magdalena Andersson has stated that the strict migration line will remain in place after a change of government.
A report by Euractiv on August 6, 2026, noted that Andersson has shifted her migration stance and had avoided joining the criticism of Sánchez over Ceuta.
