Threat emailed to Lindh two weeks ago

SWEDISH Foreign Minister Anna Lindh was sent an email threatening her and her children two weeks before she was fatally stabbed while out shopping, the Foreign Ministry said yesterday.

The email accused Lindh who campaigned hard for Swedes to vote Yes to joining the euro in a referendum of being a "power- hungry bitch sitting in the lap of big business", public service SR radio quoted from the letter.

The email, which was not passed on to police, was sent to Lindh on August 27, the day after an article written by her and Carl-Henric Svanberg, chief executive of flagship telecoms company Ericsson, was published in a leading daily newspaper.