A DANISH court yesterday dismissed a defamation lawsuit against a newspaper that first published the Prophet Mohammed cartoons that touched off protests in the Islamic world.

Arabs today criticised a Danish court’s decision to exonerate the newspaper that first published the Prophet Mohammed cartoons that provoked riots across the Muslim world.

Syria’s interior minister was found dead in his office, days before the release of a UN report that could implicate high-ranking Syrian officials in the murder of Lebanon’s former prime minister.