Bus passengers crushed to death
DAR ES SALAAM: At least 41 people were killed and dozens injured when a bus and a truck collided on a busy road in south-west Tanzania yesterday, police said, giving warning that the death toll could rise.
Officers said many died when a container being ferried on the truck fell on the bus, crushing the victims on a highway in Iringa. MALMO: His public appearances are cancelled, friends shy away and he is confined to a safehouse, but Swedish artist Lars Vilks, twice targeted by Islamist assassins, says he has no regrets even though he feels like those who wish him dead are winning.
The 68-year-old sparked outrage among Muslims in 2007 with a drawing portraying the Prophet Muhammad as a dog. That led to an Iraqi group linked to al-Qaeda placing a $100 000 bounty on his head.
In February, he went into hiding after a radicalised Dane shot dead two people at a free-speech event he attended in a Copenhagen synagogue.
Since then, lectures in Sweden have been cancelled, some of his friends have stopped seeing him, and neighbours have asked his landlord to evict him from his home even though the nearest one is over a kilometre away.
“Artistic life, when you are examining and researching today’s world, is risky business,” he said at a secure location in central Malmo, flanked by three bodyguards. “I am hardened now and have grown into a situation that has escalated gradually.”
Vilks said he hopes the situation will calm down in coming months but is resigned to living under threat for the rest of his life. He said people like himself, novelist Salman Rushdie and cartoonist Kurt Westergaard are forever in al-Qaeda’s “hall of fame”. “These people are not in a hurry. It is very seldom that anyone is forgotten.”
Vilks has been given round-the-clock police protection and several would-be killers have been put in prison, including one called “Jihad Jane”. His attackers, he said, have already had great success in intimidating those around him. “Many are now very worried. There are those who are very reluctant to be seen or to socialise with me. Fear is the true ally of terrorism,” he said.
He has spent the past few weeks moving from one safe house to another. He has been told he cannot go back to his home for the foreseeable future.
His daily activity is now dictated by his security team and he exercises indoors instead of taking walks outside. “It’s a hassle if you get seen because then you have to move straight away,” Vilks said.
Such restrictions have forced him to develop his painting, which he relies on to support himself. Prints of his Muhammad dog painting sell for $215 each. – Reuters