A GERMAN NEWSPAPER in the northern port city of Hamburg that reprinted Mohammed cartoons from the French satirical paper Charlie Hebdo was the target of an arson attack early today.
“Rocks and then a burning object were thrown through the window,” a police spokesman told AFP.
Two rooms on lower floors were damaged but the fire was put out quickly.
The regional tabloid daily, the Hamburger Morgenpost, had splashed three Charlie Hebdo cartoons on its front page after the massacre at the Paris publication, running the headline “This much freedom must be possible!”
No one was hurt in the attack, which police said occurred at about 1.20am Irish time.
Two people were detained, while state security has opened an investigation, police said.
Whether there was a connection between the Charlie Hebdo cartoons and the attack was the “key question”, the police spokesman said, adding that it was “too soon” to know for certain.
Police declined to provide further information about the suspects.
No one at the Hamburger Morgenpost, known locally as the Mopo and which has a circulation of around 91,000, could immediately be reached for comment.
“Thick smoke is still hanging in the air, the police are looking for clues,” the newspaper said in its online edition.
Media reports said the newspaper’s publishers had ordered private security protection for the building in the western district of Othmarschen.
German news agency DPA reported that the attack had occurred from a courtyard of the building and hit the newspaper’s archive room where some records were destroyed.
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