British police said they had arrested three men on suspicion of terrorism today after a fire at the office of a London firm that is about to publish a controversial novel.
The Jewel of Medinaby journalist Sherry Jones traces the life of the Prophert Mohammad's child bride, A'isha, from her engagement when she was six, until the prophet's death.
Armed officers arrested two of the men in the street outside a property in a north London square in the early hours of this morning. The third was arrested nearby.
Police said a small fire was put out at a property in the square and the blaze was "being linked to the arrests of the men". The fire, which caused minor damage, was at a building housing the office of Gibson Square publishers.
The arrested men, aged 40, 30 and 22, were being held at a central London police station on suspicion of the "commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism," police said, adding that four properties in London had been searched.
Gibson Square said this month it had bought the rights to publish
The Jewel of Medinaafter Random House, a unit of Bertelsmann AG, dropped plans to publish the novel fearing it could "incite acts of violence". The book is due to be published in Britain in October.
A green corrugated metal sheet covered the entrance to the building today. A spokesman for Gibson Square could not immediately be reached for comment.
Ms Jones said in August she was shocked Random House had abandoned publication. "I have deliberately and consciously written respectfully about Islam and Mohammad ... I envisioned that my book would be a bridge-builder," she told Reuters.
Random House said at the time it had been advised that the book might be offensive to some in the Muslim community and could incite violence by a "small, radical segment".
Publishers in 10 countries, including Britain, later bought the rights to the novel.
The novel was pulled from bookstores in Serbia in August to avoid conflict with the country's Muslim minority, the publisher said, although it later went back on sale.