The Queen in open-hearted interview on children

The Queen & Tomas Ramberg. Photo: Mattias Ahlm/SR

The Queen has given an exclusive interview on exploited children in Sweden and the world. It was Swedish Radio’s senior reporter Tomas Ramberg and his weekly Saturday interview program “Ekots lördagsintervju” that sat down with Queen Silvia at Drottningholm for an outspoken interview.

Her Majesty talked about how her commitment to children and children’s issues started already at the time of her wedding to King Carl XVI Gustaf in 1976 when they set up the Royal Wedding Fund with capital from gifts in connection to the engagement and wedding. The fund, focusing on handicapped children and youth and physical activity, still exists today and now focuses on research and development grants. The Queen once again expressed worries for the Internet and said that while it is an important and great thing it can be diabolic and misused very easily. The fast development and technical advancement with digital technology used instead of camera film and videotapes for example, assists in the quick spread of child pornography.
- There are clubs were one doesn’t pay to be a member, instead one pays by child pornography pictures. Every picture is a great suffering for a child, a terrible event.

Apropos a Government-appointed commissioner of inquiry who in 2007 presented a report on extending the Swedish children pornography legislation to also forbid not only to occupy documents of films but also to watch them, Queen Silvia said that she supports such an extension of the law. She also voiced understanding for concerns of privacy but said that in these matters our children come before privacy. Norway and Denmark are two of Sweden’s neighbour countries who have already introduced this kind of legislation and the Queen wished that our politicians would look at how they had done it.

In November, the Queen will attend the World Congress III against Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The first congress was held in Stockholm in 1996 and Queen Silvia said that it was very important how the then sitting Prime Minister Ingvar Carlsson took the initiative to host it together with Ecpat. That time 122 countries participated and it was the first time the world openly talked about the issues and opened up a dialogue with NGO:s. Today there are 50,000 attempts to look at child pornography every day in Sweden and the Queen expressed that although there are some things like internet providers blocking sites and software like Netclean to assist the police and tackling the problem, everything should be done to keep offenders from coming in contact with children.

Next year the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child turns 20, a convention that the Queen labelled as fantastic and says is the leading light in the World Childhood Foundation’s work. She though wondered how the work with it is working in the schools and would wish to see it being more spread among children so that they can learn about their rights. Her Majesty also expressed wishes that the United States would finally also ratify the convention, that this would be something on their mind for the coming years.

When it came to refugee children living in hiding in Sweden, so called “paper less”, the Queen said that it’s an incredibly difficult situation and a lot of suffering that they are exposed for, but was careful and said that although she would like to answer, it might be a too political issue and something better be discussed in private with responsible politicians than in public interviews.

On the question if there is too much of a gag on the Royal Family, the Queen said perhaps and that it can be difficult to balance being a thinking human being and a royal who is to be apolitical. At time when a royal give statements that can be interpreted as political or controversial by some, there is often an incredibly media drive following it, leading to difficulties for the Royal Family to share their own views in public life. The Queen made an example and said that many years ago when she and the King had their children in school, a reporter asked them about their views of school grades, but when they replied about what they thought as parents, a big storm erupted from it. Her Majesty said that the Royal Family respects what the Government and politicians do and never interferes in politics, but that of course it’s not always easy with personal issues that are matters of heart were one might want to express a personal view.

The Queen & Tomas Ramberg. Photo: Mattias Ahlm/SR

More: you can listen to the interview here, just click on the speaker icon.