Denmark terrorism plot thwarted with arrest of five suspected militant Islamists

Scandinavian authorities thwarted what they describe as a terrorist attack in Denmark targeting the newspaper that published the infamous caricatures of the prophet Muhammad, arresting five suspected Islamic militants Wednesday. According to a statement published by the Danish spy agency PET, the suspected militants’ target was the Copenhagen offices of Jyllands Posten, the newspaper that in 2005 published cartoons lampooning Muhammad, who founded the Islamic religion in the 7th century. The cartoons prompted an international uproar.

Jakob Scharf, head of PET, described the suspects as “militant Islamists” with “connections to international terror networks” who had sought to penetrate the offices of Jyllands-Posten in Copenhagen and “kill as many as possible.”
At a joint news conference held in Copenhagen on Wednesday by Danish and Swedish intelligence, Scharf said the planned attack had been imminent.
“The attack would be carried out before Jan. 1 and one would have then entered the newspaper and using the machine gun, killing as many as possible,” he said.
The alleged plot underscores what security officials see as a rising threat by Islamic extremists against Scandinavian countries that once considered themselves unlikely targets of such attacks.