News from Denmark: The war continues.

Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen has been in Iraq where he met with the Iraqi prime minister Nuri Malika in Baghdad. After the meeting Malika told journalists that it was unlikely that Danish troops would be leaving Iraq before Christmas. This slightly contradicts previous statements Malika made after he'd met with Tony Blair. On that occaision the Iraqi PM told the media that Iraq's own forces would be able to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq by the new year.

Later, Anders Fogh Rasmussen paid a surprise visit to the 535 Danish soldiers at Camp Dannevang and told them that twice, when Danish soldiers had been killed by terrorists, he had had second thoughts as to the validity of Denmarks contribution. Naturally he then praised their work and committed himself and Denmark to the project of advancing democracy in Iraq.

moif: The Danish military presence in Iraq is largely symbolic and (I think) depends largely on UK forces for operational and logistical support. I can't imagine that the Danish forces would be left in Iraq for long without the British.

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Mean while the WOT continues to be fought in the shadows. A week ago Jyllandsposten reported on an attempted theft of Anthrax from the Swedish University of Gotheborg.

The method was to order the bacteria under the pretext of being scientists, and it almost succeeded, says a not yet released report from the Swedish “Crisis Readiness Authority” (Krisberedskabsmyndigheten). “There was an order, from Amman I believe, the bacteria was to be sent to a post box,” says Björn Sandström, analysts at the “Total Defense Research Institute” (Totalförsvarets Forskningsinstitut) at Gothenburg University to the newspaper Daily Medicin’s Swedish Edition. It is not the first time that an attempt has been made to get the Research Institute to hand over anthrax. Shortly after 9/11 a similar attempt was experienced.

Here is a translation of the JP article and here is another regarding the theft of a ton of Beryllium.

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In other news, the Danish parliment has passed a law that allows lesbians to recieve state funding for artificial insemination (I think thats what its called in English). This happened despite the government positio.