World Peace News: Top Stories

US warns visitors to Nordic, Baltic lands
by Timothy Jacobs

The Associated Press Translate This Article
1 November 2004

RIGA, Latvia (AP) - Security was tighter around the U.S. embassies in Finland and Latvia on Monday amid a U.S. warning that Americans living and traveling in the Nordic and Baltic nations should be on guard against a possible terrorist strike.

Many governments in the region said there was no specific evidence of a planned attack, but Norway closed its embassy in Riga, the Latvian capital, and port officials in Tallinn, Estonia, said they had begun checking passengers and baggage at terminals for Baltic Sea ferries. Latvia had more undercover police out on the streets of Riga.

The U.S. State Department ''urges all U.S. citizens in the Nordic and Baltic countries to be vigilant as to their surroundings, especially in centers of ground-based mass transit, and to report any unusual or suspicious persons, incidents or circumstances to the nearest police authorities,'' the Web site of the U.S. Embassy in Finland said.

The warning, posted late Saturday, gave no other details, but came just hours after Latvia's security service said it received intelligence reports from Norway, Estonia and the United States of a possible terrorist strike in the Baltic nation of 2.3 million people. Latvia's Interior Ministry said an Islamic extremist group based in the region was behind the threat, but gave no details.

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said the U.S. election Tuesday was the likely reason for the warning, adding that ''there is no concrete indication that American interests are being threatened.'' The Finnish prime minister made similar comments.

But Norway's prime minister, Kjell Magne Bondevik, said his government decided to close its embassy in Latvia because of ''concrete information.''

There was no apparent increased police presence in downtown Riga, a city of 800,000 people. But Interior Ministry spokesman Krists Leiskalns said there were more undercover officers working and Latvian law enforcement agencies were in contact with foreign counterparts.

Despite the warnings, shoppers in Riga seemed unfazed.

''I'm not worried about an attack here any more than any other day,'' Gunars Rosentals, a Latvian-American expatriate, said as he browsed at the Spice shopping center. ''I don't think anything is going to happen, but if it did it would probably be because we have troops in Iraq.''

The governments of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania staunchly supported the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and together have more than 200 soldiers serving there. Finland, Norway and Sweden did not support the invasion. But Norway provided 150 soldiers for a time to the Iraq occupation force, and Denmark has 501 soldiers in southern Iraq, near Basra.

Copyright © 2004 The Associated Press, All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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