In an interview with the newspaper Upsala Nya Tidning, Yared Tekeste, the boss of the Uppsala Reggae Festival, has no words strong enough for the police forces, especially for the plain-clothes officers who allegedly behaved particularly badly (news of 11/08/2008). "The artists and the staff alike felt humiliated," he explains. People were crying backstage. Some artists were so angry that they wanted to demonstrate in front of the police station. I talked them out of it."
"Generally speaking, cooperation with the police has never been so good, which is why it is sad that such things happened this year." Yared Tekeste says he has sent the police a report listing all the known incidents: plain-clothes officers who refused to identify themselves during the arrests, others who allegedly tried to enter the festival grounds with alcohol and, when the staff refused, reportedly behaved aggressively.
"The way they treated Sean Paul and the other artists is totally unacceptable," Yared Tekeste insists. In his view, it is obvious that the police were seeking to make an example by arresting Sean Paul. He says they achieved the opposite effect, since people are talking more about how the Swedish authorities treat artists. "Many artists at the Sundance Festival (in Holland, editor's note) made speeches along those lines. When I heard that, I was ashamed to be Swedish."
Meanwhile, faced with the international echo of the affair, Sean Paul's management has been keen to play down the facts, even going so far as to say there were "no arrests, no raid, no secret police".