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Three Arrested in Denmark with Ties to Terrorists

August 16, 1989
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A man and two women were arrested here Friday in connection with criminal activities said to benefit a Palestinian terrorist organization.

A court ordered the suspects jailed for 13 days while police and the Danish intelligence agency, PET, prepare documentary evidence against them.

They and 11 other suspects — who have been in custody for the last four months — are believed to be members of a gang which funnels the proceeds of crime to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a terrorist organization based in Lebanon.

Seized documents link the group to weapon thefts and robbery. It also may have been implicated in a 1985 bomb attempt against a Copenhagen synagogue.

The police and the PET said they uncovered detailed plans to kidnap Jorn Rausing, son of Gad Rausing, who is one of the wealthiest men in Sweden and of Jewish origin.

The gang planned to demand $25 million ransom, which would go to the PFLP.

Police said more arrests are expected.

The affair has received wide media coverage in Denmark. Pro-Palestinian sympathies, manifested when the first arrests were made earlier this year, seem to have evaporated as the public learned of the violent nature of the gang.

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