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Two detained in arson attack at German paper that ran Charlie Hebdo cartoons

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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 Sunday, police said.

No one was hurt.

A police spokesman told AFP:

“Rocks and then a burning object were thrown through the window,.

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!”

Two Islamic extremists stormed the offices of Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday (Jan 7), killing a total of 12 people, including some of France’s best-loved satirists.

Both men were killed Friday in a standoff with police.

Link between cartoons and attack?

In the German attack, police said two people were detained, while state security has opened an investigation.

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.

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.

- AFP

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