Cops Claim Plot To Kill Danish Cartoonist

Danish police arrested several people Tuesday in a terror plot to kill one of the 12 cartoonists behind the Prophet Muhammad drawings that sparked an uproar in the Muslim world two years ago, authorities said.

The arrests were made in pre-dawn raids in Aarhus, western Denmark, "to prevent a terror-related murder," the police intelligence agency said. It did not say how many people were arrested nor did it mention which cartoonist was targeted.

The police intelligence chief said two Tunisians and a Dane of Moroccan origin were arrested in the alleged plot.

Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that first published the drawings on Sept. 30, 2005, said the suspects were planning to kill its cartoonist, Kurt Westergaard.

"There were very concrete murder plans against Kurt Westergaard," said Carsten Juste, the paper's editor-in-chief.

The cartoons were later reprinted by a range of Western publications, and they sparked deadly protests in parts of the Muslim world.

Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet, even favorable, for fear it could lead to idolatry.

Westergaard's cartoon, which showed Muhammad wearing a turban shaped as a bomb with a lit fuse, was one of the most controversial.

Westergaard, 73, and his wife Gitte, 66, had been living under police protection for more than three months because of the murder plans, Jyllands-Posten said. It also reported that those arrested included both Danish and foreign citizens.

"Of course I fear for my life when the police intelligence service say that some people have concrete plans to kill me. But I have turned fear into anger and resentment," Westergaard said in a statement published on Jyllands-Posten's Web site.

PET, the police intelligence service, called the action "preventive," saying it decided to strike "at an early phase to stop the planning and the carrying out of the murder." It said the action did not change the general threat of terrorism in Denmark.

Justice Minister Lene Espersen said the alleged plot was cause for "great concern."

The cartoon uproar in early 2006 was Denmark's biggest crisis since World War II. Danes watched in disbelief as angry mobs burned the Danish flag and attacked Danish embassies in Muslim countries including Syria, Iran and Lebanon.

Jyllands-Posten was evacuated several times because of threats and posted security guards at its office outside Aarhus and in Copenhagen.

The paper initially refused to apologize 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.

Kasem Ahmad, a spokesman for the Copenhagen-based Islamic Faith Community, a network of Muslim groups that spearheaded protests against the cartoons in Denmark, said he hoped Tuesday's arrests would not rekindle the uproar.

"We urge Muslims to take it calmly," he told the TV2 News network.

Two of the other cartoonists told The Associated press that police had advised them not to talk to the media.

The Danish Journalists Union also urged them to "keep a low profile," union vice president Fred Jacobsen said.

"This is a story that won't die. It's disgusting that people are exposed to death threats simply because they are doing their jobs," he said.

Danish investigators have foiled at least two alleged terror plots since the cartoon crisis. Two Muslim immigrants and a Dane who converted to Islam were sentenced to prison in November after being found guilty of plotting a terror attack.

During the trial, prosecutors presented wiretap recordings of the defendants discussing possible targets, including the Jyllands-Posten offices. The defendants said they were just joking when discussing possible attacks.

In September, eight people were arrested in what Danish intelligence said was a crackdown on Islamic militants with links to senior al Qaeda leaders. Only two of them face preliminary charges.

The rage over the caricatures resonated beyond Denmark. In Germany, two men were accused of planting bombs aboard a pair of German commuter trains in 2006 that failed to explode.

One of the men, Youssef Mohammed el-Hajdib, a Lebanese citizen, is on trial in Duesseldorf. The second man, Jihad Hamad, was convicted in December in Lebanon and sentenced to 12 years in prison.

El-Hajdib told the court last week that Hamad planned the attacks as revenge after some German newspapers reprinted the Muhammad caricatures.

Hamad, however, testified at his trial in Lebanon that el-Hajdib was the initiator of the failed plot. He said el-Hajdib brainwashed him and exposed him to extremist videos and propaganda.