Copenhagen emergency services in major exercise, far-right party leader threatens to sue rival, government wants to suspend violent pupils and more news from Denmark this Wednesday.
Denmark’s biggest hospital tests crisis response
Rigshospitalet, Denmark’s largest hospital, carried out a major exercise in Copenhagen yesterday testing its response to a major crisis scenario.
Police, fire services and paramedics all took part in the exercise which used a hypothetical scenario in which a car had been driven into a crowd by two perpetrators who subsequently carried out a knife attack during a concert at Parken Stadium.
As many as 600 people were involved in practising how emergency services would respond to a serious incident of this type.
The hospital carries out similar exercises every two years, aimed at preparing for a crisis with a large number of patients, but police and other emergency services have not previously been involved.
“It was a large setup and very interesting to play an incident out on the ground, in some cases all the way up to intensive care and into operating theatres. I am very pleased and feel secure and proud about it,” the senior consultant at Rigshospitalet’s Trauma Centre, and head of clinical emergency response, Kristian J. Andersen told news wire Ritzau.
Far-right party leader threatens political rival with lawsuit
The leader of the far-right Danish People’s Party (DF), Morten Messerschmidt, says he is going to sue centre-left Radikale Venstre (Social Liberal) leader Martin Lidegaard for defamation over Lidegaard’s criticism of recent pronouncements by Messerschmidt.
The DF leader last week said he wants thousands of foreign nationals to be ‘remigrated’ or thrown out of Denmark if they receive welfare benefits or are not financially self-sufficient. He also said he wants first offences like stealing a bicycle to result in being ejected from the country, if committed by a foreign national.
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Lidegaard strongly criticised this, calling it “the most extreme” policy from an established party he’d seen in Danish politics. He is reported to have then said at a local election debate in Randers that DF wants to “intern and deport” people based on “skin colour.”
Messerschmidt responded by giving Lidegaard 24 hours to retract this, which he did not. The DF leader says he will now sue, DR and other media report.
Government wants to let head teachers suspend violent pupils
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and the government wants to give head teachers new powers to suspend violent pupils in the seventh, eighth and ninth grades.
The PM said there are currently too many steps involved in removing a violent teenage pupil from a class environment.
“Imagine a 15-year-old who punches another pupil in the head. There are currently too many steps involved in doing something about it at the school,” she said in an interview with newspaper Berlingske.
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“The head teacher should be able to take responsibility and say “we don’t want this at the school, you’re suspended.”
The suspension would initially be temporary with the pupil sent to another school, typically an ungdomsskole meaning a facility specifically for teenagers, for up to 50 days.
Resident arrested after suspected arson attack on asylum facility
A resident of the Kærshovedgård ‘departure centre’ for rejected asylum seekers has been arrested after a fire broke out at the facility on Tuesday.
He is scheduled to appear for preliminary court proceedings in nearby town Herning on Wednesday, news wire Ritzau writes based on reporting from regional media Midtvest.
A fire alert was initially raised just after 11am, when police, ambulance and fire services were dispatched to the location, which is used to house persons with no residence rights in Denmark, including rejected asylum seekers and convicted foreign nationals with deportation sentences.
No injuries to either residents or staff were reported.