DAMASCUS, Feb. 4 (Xinhuanet) -- Hundreds of Syrian demonstrators stormed and set fire to the Danish Embassy in Damascus on Saturday in a protest against cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammad which were first published by a Danish newspaper.

    The demonstration in front of the Danish Embassy in downtown Damascus went on peacefully at first, but angry protestors later stormed the embassy building and set it on fire, said witnesses.

    The building also houses the Swedish and Chilean missions.

    Many protestors chanted "God is Great" and burned the Danish flag and replaced it with another flag reading "No God but Allah, Mohammad is His Prophet."

    Some demonstrators marched in the main Mezza street, causing a traffic jam there. The protestors then pushed forward into the wealthy Eastern Mezza Area, where resided many western missions.

    It was not immediately clear whether any casualties were caused.

    Earlier this week, the Danish embassy was reportedly evacuated following an anonymous telephone bomb threat.

    Embassy personnel returned to the building after an hour-long search by security forces who failed to find any explosive device.

    The cartoons were published by the Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten, last September and republished in Norway last month and then in some other European newspapers. One of the cartoons depicts the prophet wearing a turban shaped like a bomb.

    Damascus has recalled its ambassador from Denmark for consultation over the matter, the official SANA news agency reported on Wednesday.

    Earlier in the week, the Syrian Foreign Ministry condemned the cartoons as an offense to Muslims and Arabs and demanded the Danish government punish the offending paper.

    The Danish ambassador to Syria met late Thursday with Syria's grand mufti Sheikh Ahmed Badr al-Dean Hassoun and conveyed Denmark's apology for the offense caused by the cartoons.

    SANA quoted the Danish ambassador as saying that the majority of the Danes were very sorry for this situation which the
newspaper has put them into.

    According to Islamic tradition, realistic depictions of prophets were prohibited and caricatures of them were considered profane. Enditem