Dane among those arrested in probe into cartoonist death plot
The men arrested on suspicion of plotting to kill one of the 12 cartoonists behind the Prophet Muhammad drawings were two Tunisians and a Dane of Moroccan origin, Danish police have revealed.
The drawings sparked uproar in the Muslim world two years ago.
The arrests were made in pre-dawn raids in Aarhus, western Denmark, âto prevent a terror-related murderâ, the police intelligence agency said.
Intelligence service director Jakob Scharf said the 40-year-old Danish suspect faced a preliminary charge of violating a Danish terror law, but would likely be released after questioning as the investigation continues.
The two Tunisians would be expelled from Denmark because they were considered threats to national security.
The intelligence chief stressed that the operation was a "preventive measure" and was based on surveillance carried out over a period of time.
"Not wanting to take any undue risks, PET (the intelligence service) has decided to intervene at a very early stage in order to interrupt the planning and the actual assassination," Mr Scharf said.
The arrests startled Danes, who had come to believe that the cartoon crisis was a closed chapter.
"The case shows that, unfortunately, there are in Denmark group of extremists that do not accept and respect the basis principles on which the Danish democracy has been built on," Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said.
The cartoon uproar was Denmark's biggest crisis since the Second World War. Danes watched in disbelief as angry mobs burned the Danish flag and attacked Danish embassies in Muslim countries including Syria, Iran and Lebanon.
The paper initially refused to apologise for the cartoons, which it said it published in reaction to a perceived self-censorship among artists dealing with Islamic issues, but later said it regretted that the cartoons had offended Muslims.
The Danish government also expressed regrets to Muslims, while noting that it could not interfere with the freedom of the press.
