Sweden truck attack suspect admits to terrorist crime: lawyer

The main suspect in the truck attack in Stockholm that killed four people and injured 15 has admitted to committing a terrorist crime, his lawyer has told a court.

Police believe Rakhmat Akilov, a 39-year-old from the Central Asian republic of Uzbekistan, was the driver of the hijacked beer truck that mowed down pedestrians on a busy street in the Swedish capital on Friday before crashing into a department store.

"His position is that he admits to a terrorist crime and accepts therefore that he will be detained," Johan Eriksson, the lawyer representing him, told the hearing on Tuesday before the court ruled his client be remanded in custody.

Akilov, who entered the courtroom with a green jumper over his head before being seated between his lawyer and translator, was arrested just hours after the attack.

He was already wanted by police for failing to comply with a deportation order.

Security services said he had expressed sympathies with extremist organisations, among them Islamic State, but they had not viewed him as a militant threat.

Akilov had asked for his defence lawyer to be replaced by a Sunni Muslim but a court denied his request, documents show.

The hearing came as Sweden's prosecution authority said it had revoked the arrest of second suspect.

"According to the prosecutor, the suspicions have weakened and there is, therefore, no ground to apply for a detention order," the prosecution authority said in a statement.

The man will not be released due to an earlier decision that he should be expelled from Sweden, the authority said.