By Lars Bevanger BBC correspondent in Stockholm

As a three minute silence was observed across Europe, people here had a chance to reflect over how their small Scandinavian country so far away from the disaster area has been one of the hardest hit nations in Europe.

There are still more than 2,300 Swedes missing or unaccounted for.

Many of the foreigners killed were from Sweden

On this cold and drizzly day, the mood here has been very sombre indeed.

Just before three in the morning, the remains of six Swedish tourists killed in the tsunami arrived at Arlanda airport outside Stockholm.

Their coffins were draped in blue and yellow Swedish flags, and carried by soldiers, one by one, onto the tarmac.

Private and official Sweden were there to pay respect - family members as well as the royal family, the prime minister and the Archbishop of the Church of Sweden.

Because more than 20,000 Swedes spend this time of year in southern Thailand, the number of dead, injured and missing from this country is high.

And in a country of just 8.9 million people, many people know someone who died or was injured.

Need for comfort

Churches across the nation have kept their doors open for all those who need to talk about what has happened.

Gunnar Olofsgaard, a Stockholm priest, told the BBC news website that it was very important to keep his church open as a space in which those affected by the catastrophe could spend time.

"Here you can come with all your grief, and you can go to this place to pray to God. Here you can pray 'God help me now, when no one else can help me'," he said.

Survivors say they are traumatised by their experiences

The arrival of the coffins brought the remote disaster much closer to home.

So have the countless testimonies of those who survived.

Titti Bjork and Henrik Soderstrom were among the lucky ones. They were warned to run away and got to high ground in time.

"We ran down to the beach with water around our feet, taking photos and asking people 'what's happening, what's happening'," Titti says.

"And we heard people shouting 'earthquake, uphill, uphill, run away!' And then we understood something was wrong, and we understood it was an earthquake under water.

"We have many nightmares. It's hard to eat, hard to sleep."

In the middle of the trauma, there is also anger.

The secretary general of the Swedish Red Cross, Christer Zettergren, is one of those who feel the government acted too late, waiting two days before sending planes to bring Swedish nationals home.

"We all were surprised by the lack of preparedness for this kind of global disaster," he said.

"In the future, perhaps there will be a civil war somewhere, and there will be Swedish tourists there. We have to have plans for those kinds of actions, and I think that is what we lacked from the very beginning."

Trauma

The government says no-one could have been prepared for a disaster on this scale, and that it acted as soon as humanly possible.

Just before the first coffins arrived, the last of the injured Swedes landed at the same airport.

I think that the number of traumas Sweden has experienced in past years... has affected Swedish society, [so] that we don't feel that secure anymore Priest Gunnar Olofsgaard

But in Thailand, long and difficult work lies ahead to identify the remaining Swedish victims.

The authorities here have warned it might take months before a final death toll is clear.

Some even fear the true number of Swedish victims will never be known.

It is yet another trauma to deal with for a nation still reeling from the killings of two prominent politicians - Prime Minister Olof Palme and more recently, Foreign Minster Anna Lindh.

Priest Gunnar Olofsgaard thinks Sweden is truly losing its innocence.

"I think that the number of traumas that Sweden has experienced over the past years, with murders of famous politicians, has affected Swedish society, that we don't feel that secure anymore," he said.