Foreign Minister Carl Bildt will close down five more embassies – including Brussels – as a result of cuts to the government's budget.

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Sweden’s government announced Tuesday that five more embassies will be closed down. The move is a result of recent cuts to the government's budget.

Embassies will be closed in Brussels, Belgium; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Hanoi, Vietnam; Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; and Luanda, Angola. The decommissioning of the five embassies will take place in 2011.

“This painful decision is a consequence of the parliament recently deciding to cut the allocation to the Government Offices by 300 million kronor ($43 million)”, Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said in a statement.

The Ministry for Foreign Affairs will also carry out a reduction in personnel both at home and abroad, it said in a separate statement. Savings will also be made through reduced travel and reduced outreach activities in the form of seminars and visits.

Last year the Swedish government decided to close its Embassy in Colombo and the Consulates-General in Kaliningrad, Canton, Los Angeles and New York. In January the minister announced that the government will open ten embassies and shut down six in a move to find a new way of maintaining bilateral contacts in the future.

More embassies and general consulates are now in danger of being closed.

"The reduction in funding for the Government Offices may require further closures in the future. Until decisions to make new changes have been taken, we cannot comment on the details concerning individual embassies and consulates", the foreign office said.

During the electoral period 18 missions abroad have been opened and 16 have been closed.

"At the same time, changes to the Foreign Service are natural, based on changes in the rest of the world and from a budgetary perspective. We can therefore expect that Sweden will continue to make changes to its presence abroad", the statement added.

The Foreign Minister was all but happy after the opposition voted down the center-right government two weeks ago, its first defeat since the September election. The red-green opposition vote in favour of the budget cuts together with the far-right xenophobic Sweden Democrats.

"Populist in Parliament decided to cut funding to Foreign Office. We must now start closing a number of embassies abroad. Idiotic in extreme." Carl Bildt wrote in a Twitter message.

Visa services at all five missions abroad will be managed within the framework of Schengen cooperation.