Kokkvold: Terrorist threat underestimated

Secretary General of the Norwegian Press Association, Per Edgar Kokkvold.Photo: NRK

The Scandinavian countries underestimate the danger of terrorism. This is the opinion of the Secretary General of the Norwegian Press Association, Per Edgar Kokkvold, reports the Norway Post.

Kokkvold commented on Tuesday’s report that two men had been arrested in the US, charged with planning a terrorist attack against the Danish newspaper Jyllandsposten and two of its editors, using explosives and guns.

US prosecutors said they have broken up an international terror plot, codenamed the Mickey Mouse Project, against the Danish newspaper that published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed. The criminal complaint, unsealed Oct. 27, alleges that Chicago-based men spent at least a year working with a Pakistan-based terrorist group to plan an attack. Two men from Chicago, who went to military school in Pakistan, face terrorism charges for allegedly targeting the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, which outraged hardline Muslims by publishing the 12 cartoons in 2005. The men allegedly planned to kill cultural editor Flemming Rose and cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. The editor of Jyllands-Posten, Jorn Mikkelsen, said the alleged plot was “very unpleasant for the employees and we are all affected by these threats”. Jyllands-Posten, Denmark’s highest-circulation daily, triggered a furore in the Muslim world by publishing the cartoons.

In Kokkvold’s opinion the planned teerorist attack shows that the Danish newspaper has become a symbolic target for Islamists. “It is time we confronted Arabic facism in a way we have not dared to do earlier,” Kokkvold says.

Source: Norway Post / Theaustralian.news.com