Honour for Danish cartoonist

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will make a speech at an event this week honouring the Danish cartoonist who sparked Muslim anger by depicting the Prophet Mohammed with a bomb as a turban, organisers said.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will make a speech at an event this week honouring the Danish cartoonist who sparked Muslim anger by depicting the Prophet Mohammed with a bomb as a turban, organisers said.

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The German chancellor, will make a speech on press freedom at Wednesday's ceremony in Potsdam, near Berlin, awarding Kurt Westergaard, 75, the M100 Media Prize 2010, organisers said in a statement.

With Westergaard subject to death threats, there would be an "appropriate" security presence at the event, police spokesman Rudi Sonntag said.

Westergaard drew the most controversial of 12 caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed in 2005, which many Muslims considered offensive..

The drawings sparked protests in January and February 2006 that culminated with the torching of Danish diplomatic offices in Damascus and Beirut and the death of dozens of people in Nigeria.

In 2008, around 20 Danish newspapers reproduced the drawings triggering further protests in Muslim countries including Sudan, Egypt, Pakistan and Indonesia.

Westergaard said in June he was retiring from the

Jyllands-Posten newspaper in the hope of damping down the danger to himself and fellow journalists.