COPENHAGEN (Reuters) -A Danish election candidate said 10 election posters of himself standing next to the Tibetan flag were removed shortly after he put them up outside the Chinese Embassy in a suburb of the capital Copenhagen.
Thomas Rohden, a candidate in upcoming local elections and a known critic of China, said he had reported a theft of the posters and that he assumed the Chinese Embassy was behind it.
The embassy did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment. Police said they were considering an investigation.
After he put up the posters on Sunday, “I saw people coming out of the embassy, creating a bit of a fuss about it,” Rohden told Reuters. Hours later, the posters were gone, he said.
On Tuesday, Rohden hung new posters depicting the Tibetan flag outside the embassy.
Denmark’s Foreign Minister Jeppe Kofod said in a statement he found the incident “worrying” and that he will await a decision by the police before taking further action in the case.
“We must and will stand by our values and principles,” Kofod said.
Rohden said the posters were meant as a protest of a 2012 partnership accord between Danish health authorities and the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu. Public records show the deal is no longer active but has yet to be formally terminated.
China has ruled the remote western region of Tibet since 1951 when its army marched in and took control in what it called a “peaceful liberation”. Beijing brands Tibet’s current Dalai Lama, exiled in neighbouring India, as a dangerous separatist.
(Reporting by Nikolaj SkydsgaardEditing by Mark Heinrich and Jonathan Oatis)
