Nixon portraits not welcome in Norwegian parliament

Link : http://uk.news.yahoo.com/041004/323/f3vd8.html


OSLO (AFP) - Portraits of former US president Richard Nixon which were hung in the Norwegian parliament have been removed after a number of the country's parliamentarians complained that the paintings were "shocking", officials said.

"Following an evaluation, it was determined that the piece was unfitting and potentially shocking," Secretary General of the parliament Hans Brattestaa told AFP.

As a result of the MPs' complaints, the three-portrait series of Nixon holding a cup of coffee in his hand were taken down only a few days after they were hung in a new foreign affairs committee meeting room in the parliament building.

"On one hand (the work) delivers a political message that is not the most appropriate," Brattestaa said, adding that the portraits would be exposed in "a more insignificant place".

Republican Nixon, who led America from the White House from 1969 until 1974, was the first US president to resign from office.

He resigned in connection with the Watergate scandal, in which it was revealed that burglars connected to his administration had attempted to plant listening devices in the Democratic National Committee offices in the Watergate building in Washington, and that Nixon had ordered the FBI to abandon its investigation of the break-in.

"I can accept total artistic freedom, but I don't think that the meeting room of the Foreign Affairs Committee is the most appropriate place to exhibit this kind of expression in respect to the former head of state and politician," said former Norwegian prime minister and current head of the committee Thorbjoern Jagland.