- Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is recovering from an assault in Copenhagen, causing a minor neck injury.
- Authorities remanded a 39-year-old Polish man in custody, stating no political motive.
- Frederiksen expressed a shift in the public domain in recent years, with increased threats, harsh social media tone, and aggressive behavior.
On Tuesday, Denmark’s Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen stated that she was still recovering both physically and mentally from an assault in central Copenhagen last week and warned about an increase in public aggression.
Authorities remanded a 39-year-old Polish man in custody over the assault, which caused her to suffer a minor neck injury. The attacker was under the influence of alcohol and drugs at the time, and authorities stated that nothing indicated a political motive.
“I’m not quite myself yet,” Frederiksen said in an interview with broadcaster DR. “I look after my work as prime minister, and I always will. I was also able to do so over the weekend, but not in the same way as I normally do.”
Just three weeks after an assassination attempt seriously injured Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico, the assault occurred. Frederiksen stated that she has witnessed a shift in the public domain in recent years.
“We all experience across (political) parties that the boundaries are shifting wildly,” she said.
“There’s been threats over a long period, a very harsh tone on social media, which has gotten worse, and especially after the war in the Middle East, a lot of shouting in public, people behaving very, very aggressively,” she said.
Surveys rank the small bicycle-friendly country as one of the happiest in the world, and Danes pride themselves on their inclusiveness, equality, and generous welfare model.
“We have been proud of a country where the prime minister cycles to work,” she said.
“But a shift has occurred. I’ve always made myself available, but the street scene has changed, and there are places where we can no longer go, at least some of us politicians,” she said.
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