In the Bullpen » Jyllands-Posten Apologizes…sort of (Part II)

Sunday, February 19, 2006

Jyllands-Posten Apologizes…sort of (Part II)

The news wires are buzzing with Jyllands-Posten’s decision to run a full-page ad in the pan-Arab newspaper Asharq al-Awasat along with Saudi papers al-Riyadh and al-Jazira. The “apology” was also posted on their website. A sampling:

“These drawings apparently hurt millions of Muslims around the world, so we now offer our apology and deep regret for what happened because it is far from the paper’s intention,” said the statement titled “Apology” in big bold letters addressed to Muslim citizens and printed in Asharq al-Awasat Sunday.

It was signed by the paper’s editor-in-chief Carsten Juste and was also posted in Arabic on Jyllands-Posten’s website under a link titled “A new formulation for the apology.”

“We did not set out to offend or insult any religion. We apologise for being misunderstood and reiterate that we did not intend to target anyone … I hope this clears the misunderstanding and God bless,” said the statement. [Source] [Image Source]

As AFP notes, Juste stopped short of explicitly saying sorry for printing the cartoons themselves. On the other hand, cartoonist Kurt Westergaard says he has no regrets for drawing them or having them published. He told the Scottish Herald (while in hiding since there is a bounty on his head) that “the cartoons were inspired by ‘terrorism – which gets its spiritual ammunition from Islam’”.

Update: The Danish paper is denying the new apology. It seems like the newspapers simply republished an apology posted on Jyllands-Posten’s web site earlier this month, according to Haaretz. This kinda changes/kills the whole story it seems.Â

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Jyllands-Posten Denies Apology…

Yes, I know, we’ve been here before, but I just think this is something that needs to be stressed. From Politiken today, excerpts from an interview with Carsten Juste, Editor-in-Chief of J-P:
I simply do not know of any ads in Arab papers….

Trackback by Agora — Monday, February 20, 2006 @ 7:23 am UTC

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Ha, I love it. “We apologise for being misunderstood“.

Comment by Debbie — Sunday, February 19, 2006 @ 1:43 pm UTC
From the Jyllands-Posten editor on why the cartoons were printed in the first place:

‘The reporter’s original concept was to investigate to what extent self-censorship exists in Denmark. Starting out with Kaare Bluitgen’s children’s book about Mohammed, to which apparently no illustrator dared openly contribute. There were other, similar, examples. That was how we started out. The idea was to write to 40 illustrators and ask if they would draw Mohammed for publication in Jyllands-Posten.

‘That’s why I can categorically reject any suggestion that the point was to provoke Muslims. If we want to talk about provocation – which in any circumstances I don’t feel it was – then we were provoking the illustrators who didn’t dare use their freedom of expression, out of fear of reprisals from extremist Muslims.

‘That was the goal: to find out whether self-censorship exists in Denmark to a greater degree than generally acknowledged. Which in my opinion is a perfectly legitimate journalistic project. We wanted to find out whether or not Danish newspaper illustrators dared to draw Mohammed.’

Comment by Chad Evans — Sunday, February 19, 2006 @ 1:59 pm UTC