Copenhagen: Denmark fears that security at
the upcoming UN climate conference will be compromised by
revelations in a book by a former Danish commando, the
Politiken newspaper reported on Friday.
Defence Minister Soeren Gade told a parliamentary
committee yesterday that details about summit security were
among the reasons the Danish military tried -- unsuccessfully
-- to ban the book, it said, citing several unnamed
sources.
Much of Staff Sergeant Thomas Rathsack`s book "Hunter:
With the Elite at War" deals with the work of Denmark`s elite
Jaegerkorpset (Huntsmen Corps) special forces unit in
Afghanistan and Iraq.
But it also mentions security measures taken for a
European Union summit in Copenhagen in 2002 -- including how
EU leaders in an emergency would have been rescued from their
hotel-room windows by rappelling soldiers.
With support from the defence ministry, the Danish armed
forces tried to get the book banned on grounds of military
secrecy, notably invoking the security of Danish soldiers in
Afghanistan.
But a court refused its request, saying excerpts had
already appeared in Politiken a few days earlier and were
widely available on the Internet.
More than half of Denmark`s police officers are being
mobilised for the two-week UN climate change conference in
December that will see a number of heads of state and
government in Copenhagen.
Bureau Report
