As prime minister, you can have your government propose laws and try to get parliament to decide on them, but once that’s done, your role in how they are implemented is absolutely zero. There certainly are countries around the world where the judiciary is little more than an instrument of the arbitrary powers of the ruling strongman, and where the political leadership can send people in and out of prison at their discretion. Sweden is most certainly not one of those countries.
A Swedish prime minister who tries to order a court to release a suspect or dismiss a case is first going to fail and then, with high probability, will be kicked out of office.
I wouldn’t say that our judiciary necessarily handles every single case in a way that is beyond any reproach, but its independence is far preferable to a system of arbitrary justice influenced by the whims of politics, be they domestic or foreign. The independence of the judiciary is rightly seen as a hallmark of a truly free society. In this we are no different from the United States.
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