/ 24 October 2005

Stalker targets former Abba singer

Former Abba group member Agnetha Faltskog has again been targeted by a stalker, a former boyfriend described as being obsessed with the 55-year-old singer, Stockholm newspaper Expressen reported on Monday.

Over the weekend, neighbours spotted the man — identified as 39-year-old Dutch national Gert van der Graaf — near Faltskog’s home in Ekero, west of Stockholm.

Faltskog has for years avoided the limelight, but last year released the album My Colouring Book.

At the end of the 1990s, Van der Graaf and Faltskog had an affair that lasted two years. After they broke up, he became obsessed with her and repeatedly was seen on the grounds of her large mansion.

In 2003, he was arrested when he tried to break into her house and was sentenced. A court had previously ordered that he should be expelled and issued a restraining order.

The ban against his entry to Sweden expired this summer.

Over the weekend, television viewers from about two dozen countries voted Abba’s hit Waterloo as the all-time favourite in a special broadcast marking the 50th anniversary of the Eurovision Song Contest.

None of the ex-members of Abba were present at the show. — Sapa-DPA