In Norway the debate on the so called Muhammad cartoons is back on the agenda as a result of the January 1 attack on Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. Per Edgar Kokkvold, secretary general of the Norwegian Press Association, is critical of the general decision among Norwegian newspapers not to publish the caricatures. Not to publish…
The Swedish artist Lars Vilks, who in the autumn of 2007 published a drawing of Muhammad as a “roundabout dog”, received a threat over the phone January 4. The caller, who was later tracked to Somalia, spoke in broken Swedish and said that after Kurt Westergaard Vilks was next. Lars Vilks says he gets many…
The incoming head of NATO Fogh Rasmussen called for a balance between free speech and respect for religious feelings, after a dispute over his support for the right to caricature the prophet Muhammad. Rasmussen, who received objections from Turkey about his suitability for NATO’s top job, said he plans to pay close attention to religious…
In his most recent audio recording, Osama bin Laden warned Europe of a reckoning for publishing controversial cartoons of the prophet Muhammad. In the message, which was addressed to intelligent ones, bin Laden said that the publishing of the insulting drawings was a greater crime than Western forces targeting Muslim villages, and killing women and…
Twenty-five year-old Asmaa Abdol-Hamid announced her candidacy for the Danish parliament in Copenhagen, Folketing. Abdol-Hamid first became a national celebrity last year as a activist who fought in vain before the courts against the publication of the Muhammad cartoons. Turbulence surrounds her candidacy. The Right is outraged and the Left is skeptical about her place…
