Ireland arrests 7 over Swedish cartoonist plot

Irish police arrested seven people on Tuesday in connection with an alleged plot to murder a Swedish cartoonist over a drawing depicting the Prophet Muhammad.

The police said they had detained four men and three women in the southern counties of Waterford and Cork as part of an investigation into a "conspiracy to murder an individual in another jurisdiction".

They declined to give details of the suspects except to say their ages ranged from mid 20s to late 40s. But the national broadcaster RTE said the detainees were originally from Morocco and Yemen.

A police source confirmed press reports that they were Muslims arrested over an alleged plot to assassinate Swedish cartoonist Lars Vilks, who has a $100,000 bounty on his head from an al-Qaeda-linked group.

"The operation... is part of an investigation into a conspiracy to commit a serious offence (namely, conspiracy to murder an individual in another jurisdiction)," said a statement from Ireland's national police service.

It added that the operation involved law enforcement agencies in the United States and a number of European countries.

The operation... is part of an investigation into a conspiracy to commit a serious offence

Police statement

A matter of self-censorship

Swedish newspaper Nerikes Allehanda published a cartoon on August 18, 2007, depicting the Prophet Mohammed in a derogatory manner in order to illustrate an editorial on self-censorship and freedom of expression and religion.

The cartoon prompted protests by Muslims in the town of Oerebro, west of Stockholm, where the newspaper is based. Egypt, Iran and Pakistan made formal complaints and death threats were issued against Vilks.

An al-Qaeda front organization offered $150,000 to anyone who slit Vilks' throat or $100,000 for his murder by other means, while they also offered $50,000 to kill newspaper editor-in-chief Ulf Johansson.

The uproar echoed that caused in Denmark by the publication by a newspaper in September 2005 of 12 drawings focused on Islam, including several of Prophet Muhammad.

Muslims worldwide, angered both by the association of their religion with terrorism and by the showing of images of the Prophet, which most consider blasphemous in themselves, took to the streets in protest.

In February 2008, Danish police said they had foiled a plot to murder on of the cartoonists, Kurt Westergaard, while another attempt on his life was allegedly made by a Somali man in January 2010.

Vilks has in the past dismissed the threats against him as "scare tactics" and, supported by the Swedish media, has insisted on the importance of publishing such material in defense of Sweden's freedom of expression.