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LITTLE MERMAID

Denmark’s Little Mermaid vandalised with Russian flag

The Little Mermaid statue in Copenhagen was vandalised on Thursday after the colours of the Russian flag were painted onto its base.

Published: 2 March 2023 12:25 CET
Denmark’s Little Mermaid vandalised with Russian flag
A passer-by takes a photo of The Little Mermaid in Copenhagen after the statue's latest brush with vandals. Photo: Ida Marie Odgaard/Ritzau Scanpix

Images of the tourist attraction show the red, blue and white stripes which form the Russian flag painted onto the rock on which the Mermaid sits.

Police said on Thursday morning that they had sent a patrol out to the statue.

“We will naturally initiate an investigation to find out who did this and how and when it happened,” duty officer Martin Kajberg of Copenhagen Police said.

The famous statue has been vandalised several times during its 110-year history, often with political motives but sometimes for other reasons.

The last few years alone have seen it painted blue, painted red, and tagged with a message of support for Hong Kong democracy activists.

Going further back, the mermaid’s head was stolen in 1964 and 1998 and her arm was cut off in 1984. In 2003, it was stolen from its plinth before being recovered and restored.

It has also been dressed in a burka as well as Swedish and Norwegian football jerseys.

The Little Mermaid is located on the Langelinie promenade on the northern side of Copenhagen Harbour.

The statue, made by sculptor Edvard Eriksen in 1913, depicts the character from Danish author Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale.

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CRIME

Danish government backs removing children from gang-connected families

Denmark’s government wants authorities to be able to move children out of families in which parents are gang members and is likely to formalise the measure in parliament.

Published: 9 April 2024 13:38 CEST
Danish government backs removing children from gang-connected families

The justice spokesperson with senior coalition partner the Social Democrats, Bjørn Brandenborg, told regional media TV2 Fyn that he wants authorities to have the power to remove children from their families in certain circumstances where the parents are gang members.

Brandenborg’s comments came on Monday, after Odense Municipality said it had spent 226 million kroner since 2009 on social services for eight specific families with gang connections.

“There is simply a need for us to give the authorities full backing and power to forcibly remove children early so we break the food chain and the children don’t become part of gang circles,” he said.

The measure will be voted on in parliament “within a few weeks”, he said.

An earlier agreement on anti-gang crime measures, which was announced by the government last November, includes provisions for measures of this nature, Brandenborg later confirmed to newswire Ritzau.

“Information [confirming] that close family members of a child or young person have been convicted for gang crime must be included as a significant and element in the municipality’s assessment” of whether an intervention is justified, the agreement states according to Ritzau.

The relevant part of November’s political agreement is expected to be voted on in parliament this month.

READ ALSO: Denmark cracks down on gang crime with extensive new agreement

Last year, Justice Minister Peter Hummelgaard told political media Altinget that family relations to a gang member could be a parameter used by authorities when assessing whether a child should be forcibly removed from parents.

In the May 2023 interview, Hummelgaard called the measure a “hard and far-reaching measure”.

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