Denmark and Norway on Tuesday tried to curb the damage caused by cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad published in a Danish newspaper, while Arab interior ministers called on Denmark to "firmly sanction" the authors of the caricatures.
A Norwegian magazine which reprinted the caricatures said Tuesday it "regretted" offending Muslims but stopped short of issuing an apology, a day after the editor of the Danish paper Jyllands-Posten apologized for originally publishing the cartoons last September.
"We have from the beginning said that these drawings are making Muslims angry and hurt. But we honestly never thought that this case would develop to the point where Danish products in the Middle East are being threatened to this extent," Ahmad Abu Laban, a prominent imam in Denmark's Muslim community, said in a statement.
The row has taken on a new dimension over the past days, with Danish flags being burned, products being boycotted and Copenhagen starting to take measures to protect its citizens living in Muslim countries.
Saudi Arabia has recalled its ambassador to Denmark, Libya has shut down its embassy in Copenhagen, and on Tuesday, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari summoned Denmark's ambassador over the cartoons.
Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari also handed a letter to the Danish ambassador to Iraq strongly denouncing the publication of the caricatures, saying they were an "insult to the feelings of 1.5 billion Muslims," according to Al-Iraqiyya TV, which aired footage of the meeting.
Arab interior ministers meeting in Tunisia issued a statement denouncing "the offense to Islam and the prophet published in the Danish press" and asking "the Danish government to firmly punish the authors of these offenses."
The statement also urged the Danish government to "ensure that this will not be repeated."
Iran's Foreign Ministry has also asked the Danish envoy, Claus Nielsen, to have "those responsible for the publication present their apologies to the Muslim world."
The official Sudanese News Agency, SUNA, reported Defense Minister Abdel-Rahim Mohammad Hussein as saying that Sudan has rejected "a request by the Danish defense minister to visit Sudan in protest at the publication by a Danish newspaper insulting Prophet Mohammad."
In its online edition, the Norwegian magazine's editor in chief, Vebjoern Selbekk, said that reprinting the cartoons was "not aimed at provoking" Muslims and that it was justifiable under freedom of expression laws."
"To regret the use of freedom of expression in a democratic society would damage our democratic foundations," he said.
The Norwegian government on Tuesday reiterated that it regretted if Muslims were offended but stressed its belief in fundamental rights.
"We will not apologize because in a country like Norway, which guarantees the freedom of expression, we cannot apologize for what the newspapers" print, Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg told Norwegian daily NTB. "But I am sorry that this may have hurt many Muslims."
The editor of Jyllands-Posten on Monday apologized for offending Muslims.
"These cartoons were not in violation of Danish law but have irrefutably offended many Muslims, and for that we apologize," editor in chief Carsten Juste said in a letter to the Petra news agency in Jordan. The Muslim group that spearheaded criticism of the paper said it accepted the apology.
