People enjoy the sunshine in a park in Stockholm, Sweden on June 1, 2021. From June 1, Sweden has started the first steps to ease the country's COVID-19 restrictions, meaning that restaurants can open longer, and public events can accommodate more people. (Photo by Wei Xuechao/Xinhua)

A giant straw Yule goat in the Swedish town of Gavle was set ablaze for the first time in five years, reviving a long-running tradition of locals illegally attempting to torch it and authorities scrambling to stop them.

Police said they had arrested a man in his 40s who witnesses said had been acting suspiciously before the blaze in the early hours of Friday, Reuters reported. 

The Gavle Yule goat, a 12.8-meter-tall statue made of wood and straw erected every year before Christmas, is famed not for its size but for the often elaborate schemes dreamt up to destroy it.

Authorities over the years have hired guards and deployed around-the-clock video surveillance and vast quantities of flame retardant to protect the statue, but it has been torched or otherwise destroyed at least 35 times.

It has also been run over by cars, set ablaze by fireworks and simply smashed with clubs. The webcam has been hacked and the local tourism administration said there was once a botched plan to kidnap it using a helicopter.

Reuters