Sweden's prime minister has called on the chief of the armed forces to help curb the rise in killings by criminal gangs.
They will meet with the police chief on Friday to discuss the role of the military.
The prime minister made the call a day after two men were killed in the country's capital, Stockholm, and a 25-year-old woman was killed in an explosion in a city north of the capital.
"We will catch the gangs and we will defeat them," promised Ulf Kristerson, the prime minister, in one of his rare televised addresses.
Mikael Biden, head of the armed forces, told the Swedish newspaper Dagens Niheter (Dagens Nyheter) that he is ready to help the police.
It is not clear exactly how the military might be involved, but previous talks have suggested that soldiers could take over some policing duties to free up much-needed crime-fighting resources.
Some critics believe that the proposed measures are superficial, because they refer to symptoms and not to the root causes of violence.
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During September, 12 people were killed in armed conflict between groups, which is the highest number since December 2019, writes Dagens Nichter.
Swedish media have linked the recent conflict to a group known as the Foxtrot Network, split into two rival factions.
Kristerson stated that nothing similar had happened before in Sweden and that "no other country in Europe" had encountered such a situation.
He emphasized that children and innocent bystanders are increasingly victims of violence throughout the country.
An overnight explosion in Fuller, some 80 kilometers north of Stockholm, killed a woman believed to be a neighbor of a person linked to organized crime.
She went to sleep "on an ordinary evening and never woke up," the prime minister said.
A few hours earlier, a man was killed in a shooting in Jordbro, south of the capital, public broadcaster SVT announced.
The same media reported that the 18-year-old was shot around seven o'clock near a full sports field in Stockholm.
Last year, more than 60 people died in shootings across the country, which is a record number, and it is predicted that this year, 2023, the number of victims will be even higher.
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In the official government report published in 2021. it is said that one in four of the million inhabitants are killed by gunfire each year in Sweden.
In Europe, that ratio is 1,6 per million people.
Police link the violence to the poor integration of immigrants, the widening gap between rich and poor, and drug use.
The center-right minority government, which came to power last year with the support of the anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats, has yet to stop the violence.
On Thursday, the prime minister said he would press ahead with more surveillance, tougher penalties for violating gun laws, stronger deportation powers and stop-and-search zones, adding that he had learned from the mayor of New York, whom he visited last week.
"All options are on the table," he said.
But one local activist told the BBC he was "deeply disappointed" by the plans, adding that they failed to address basic social issues.
Sakaria Hirsi, head of Kolektiv Sorg, a group linked to Amnesty International, called for more action on child poverty, as well as increased resources for youth clubs, social services and sports centres.
He said that the Prime Minister's speech lacked "concrete measures for those who suffer from trauma and losses, especially for children, whose grief and pain as a society we have to bear and deal with".
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