The Norwegian Embassy in Syria set on fire
The Norwegian Embassy in Damascus has been burned down, after angry demonstrators in the Syrian capital set the building on fire Saturday evening. Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere (photo) says embassy personnel will be evacuated. No Norwegians have been hurt. The Norwegian Department of Foreign Affairs has adviced Norwegian citizens to leave the country.
/ np
04.02.2006 18:39
However, the demonstrators finaly broke into the building, sacked it and set it on fire.
Earlier in the day the Danish embassy was set on fire by several hundred demonstrators.
Several thousand demonstrators roamed the streets of Damascus on Saturday protesting against the caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed which were first published by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten and later by a number of other European newspapers.
The Norwegian and Danish embassies in Damascus, Syria have been set alight by crowds numbering in the thousands.  Reports indicate both embassies have been destroyed by fire. The building hosting the Danish embassy also contained the embassies of Chile and Sweden.

The Danish embassy was initially torched, at a time when it was reportedly empty.  Officials and staff had been evacuated.  Attempts to disperse the protest outside the embassy using tear gas were carried out by Syrian police and it is reported that a number of protesters were taken to hospital.

The attacks on the embassies may have been provoked by text messages which reportedly circulated among Syrians claiming that Danes would burn copies of the Qur'an in a Copenhagen square. Some of those who gathered outside the embassies in Damascus were reported to have been chanting, "With our blood and souls we defend you, O Prophet of God. There is no god but God and Muhammad is the messenger of God."

Earlier in the week, text messaging circulated in Egypt that said;
"Denmark wants to burn the sacred Qur'an Saturday in Copenhagen in response to the Muslim boycott," and "Send (this message on) and you will be rewarded," the text said.

Despite claims in the text messages that the holy book of Islam would be burned on Saturday, there were no reports to indicate that it occurred.