A new book from the man who approved the Mohammed cartoons for Jyllands-Posten newspaper could revive tensions between the Muslim world and Denmark and trigger another Mohammed crisis, say several experts. The book by Jyllands-Posten culture editor Flemming Rose, ‘Tavshedens tyranni’ (‘Tyranny of Silence’), is scheduled to be released on 30 September. It will include the 12 drawings of Mohammed originally printed in the newspaper in 2005 – an act that subsequently resulted in boycotts of Danish products and the burning of the Danish flag in Muslim countries around the world. In 2008, three people were arrested for plotting to kill one of the cartoonists, Kurt Westergaard, who was also accosted in his home by a man with an axe in January of this year. In Chicago, terrorist David Headley, who was one of the men behind the 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai, admitted there were plans to bomb Jyllands-Posten’s head office in Copenhagen. No Danish newspaper has reprinted the cartoons since Politiken and several other media outlets in February 2008. They have, however, been reprinted countless times worldwide since then.
Evan Kohlman, an American terrorism expert, warned that reprinting the drawings could be a mistake. ‘If I were him, I would very seriously consider the consequences of reprinting the cartoons,’ Kohlman told Politiken newspaper. Ole Wøhlers Olsen, Denmark's ambassador to Algeria, said he understood that the interests of free speech needed to be reinforced. ‘But every time the drawings are reprinted, there are riots and demonstrations – and also bloodshed,’ said Olsen, who added the more radical Islamic groups would welcome the move because they would use it as propaganda. ‘And government leaders in the Arab and Muslim world will probably shake their heads and say that Danes have failed to understand that the issue is something that bothers them and creates internal problems for them,’ he said. Rose himself said the book was not an attempt to provoke Muslims. ‘I’m just telling the story of the drawings and putting them in a context about pictures that can be offensive,’ said Rose. He added that if he didn’t include the pictures, then there would be an uproar over why they weren’t in the book. Rose’s book is not the only one on the subject due out this autumn. Westergaard, the man who drew the infamous drawing of Mohammed with a bomb in his turban, has written his memoirs, ‘Manden bag Stregan’ (‘The man behind the drawing’), which are due out in November.
The Copenhagen Post
