Prophet video 'not Denmark's fault'

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Fri, 10/13/2006 8:07 AM

Ary Hermawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Danish ambassador to Indonesia met with a Muslim leader Thursday, but made clear his government could neither apologize for the ""tasteless behavior"" of its citizens, nor could it guarantee such behavior would not happen again.

Niels Erik Andersen told Din Syamsuddin, who heads Indonesia's second largest Muslim organization, Muhammadiyah, his government condemned a competition organized by the youth wing of the anti-immigration Danish People's Party in which members made drawings of the Prophet Muhammad.

The competition was taped by a member of a group called Defending Denmark. Excerpts of the video, aired by a Denmark television station and later posted on the Internet, have drawn anger from Muslim countries. Some of the drawings depicted the Prophet as a beer-drinking camel and a drunken terrorist attacking Copenhagen.

""Their tasteless behavior does in no way represent the way the Danish people or young Danish people view Muslims or Islam,"" Andersen told Din, quoting Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

Asked whether Denmark would apologize for the incident and whether it could guarantee similar incidents would not occur in the future, Andersen said, ""The society in Denmark is constructed in such a way that we are all seen as individuals, and that we all are responsible for what we have done. The government is not responsible for any act conducted by an individual.""

Din, who took postgraduate courses in the United States, said he understood why Denmark could not apologize, but added that its government ""could not escape from the responsibility"".

""The incident happened in Denmark and it was done by Danish people. And it happened for a second time,"" he said.

Along with other local Muslim leaders, Din, who is also the secretary-general of the Indonesian Ulema Council, has criticized the drawings and the airing of the video, while calling on Muslims not to be provoked.

Din earlier accused some Westerners of being ""Islamophobic"".

Andersen said the Danish government and its citizens were ready for dialog and that the relationship between Indonesia and Denmark had been good before a Danish newspaper earlier this year printed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

He also pointed out that the people of Denmark had not asked for apologies from the governments of those people who attacked Danish embassies and burned Danish flags during the uproar over the cartoons.

""The governments are not responsible for the acts of the people done in anger,"" Andersen said.

He also said his government could not simply punish those responsible for producing and airing the video. Nor could it ban citizens from doing similar things in the future.

""I do not promise the incident will not happen again. I just hope it won't happen again,"" Andersen said.

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