Stickers calling for democracy to be replaced with Islam and for women who do not wear a veil to be raped have appeared in public places in Sweden. They have been reported to the police.

Pictures of the stickers, which have been stuck to objects on streets in Nybro, Småland, have been circulating on social media.

One of the stickers reads, in English: “Women who don’t wear a headscarf are asking to be raped.” Another reads: “No democracy. We just want Islam,” Fria Tider has reported.

The stickers have been reported to the police who are currently investigating who placed them there, but admitted that at the moment they do not know who is behind them.

The appearance of the stickers comes just weeks after a number of stickers appeared in nearby Emmaboda bearing the message “Multiculturalism is bad for your children and your grandchildren.” However, those stickers were emblazoned with ‘Nordfront’, the Swedish branch of the Nordic Resistance Movement, a national socialist movement. They were also stylised, made to look like the health warnings carried on cigarette packets.

But unlike the Nordfront stickers, the Islamist stickers feature plain white text on a plain dark grey background with no logo or marking to indicate who placed them. Consequently, while some people have argued that they were placed by newly arrived asylum seekers with an agenda to promote Islam in Sweden, others have argued that they could be the work of Swedes seeking to “incite hatred” against the immigrants.

In that respect, the controversy closely resembles a recent case in which leaflets were posted through letterboxes in Manchester, England, calling on British people not to walk their dogs in public in order for the area to be kept “pure” for Muslims.

“As citizens of a multicultural nation, those who live in the UK must learn to understand and respect the legacy and lifestyle of the Muslims who live alongside them,” the leaflets read.

They were distributed by a group called Public Purity, who stated on their website their intention to have all dogs removed from the public sphere in Britain to keep Muslims pure. “If dogs are not permitted to be present in public, Muslims could live their lives with a burden lifted from their shoulders and without having to fear being tainted with no fault of their own,” the group argued.

But it was unclear who was behind the campaign, leading to disagreement online over whether it was the work of Islamic fundamentalists or British nationalists as a false flag operation.