Police raid internet cafe in major Copenhagen operation
After double shootings, at least two people detained by cops in operation
COPENHAGEN, Denmark — Armed Danish police on Sunday raided an Internet cafe in a major operation in Copenhagen near the spot where officers killed the suspected gunman behind fatal shootings, local media said.
TV2, which reported from the scene, showed footage of armed officers in dark uniforms outside the Internet cafe and said at least two people had been taken away by police.
“It’s part of our investigation,” a police official told broadcaster DR.
The swoop came hours after police told reporters they were carrying out searches in several parts of the Danish capital.
The weekend shootings — one targeting a meeting on freedom of expression, the other the city’s main synagogue — have come as a shock to Denmark, which has so far escaped any major acts of terror.
Copenhagen police said Sunday that the two recent shootings in the Danish capital were carried out by a gunman who may have been influenced by last month’s Paris terror attacks at the headquarters of the satirical Charlie Hebdo magazine and at the Hyper Cacher supermarket.
The suspect on Sunday was identified in several Danish media outlets as Omar El-Hussein. Ekstra-Bladet, a Danish tabloid, reported that the 22-year-old, Danish-born man was released from jail only two weeks ago after serving a term for aggravated assault.
Two people, including Dan Uzan, a 37-year-old security guard and member of the Copenhagen Jewish community, were killed and five police officers were wounded in the shootings, stirring fears that another terror spree was under way in a European capital a month after 17 people were killed in the Paris attacks.
On Sunday, police said they shot and killed a man they believed had carried out both shootings. The shootings take place at a free-speech event featuring an artist who had caricatured the Prophet Muhammad and, hours later, outside a synagogue in the Danish capital.
Uzan was killed outside the synagogue, which he was guarding at the time.
Police have not yet released information on the identity or motives of the attacker.
