Berlin opera to stage controversial opera Idomeneo this year

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Berlin (dpa) - The Berlin opera house which last month cancelled a production for fear of protests by Muslims announced Friday it was reinstating Idomeneo by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart this year.

Media and German politicians had accused Deutsche Oper Berlin of practising "self-censorship" and kowtowing to violent radicals.

First staged in 2003, the production has a scene devised by director Hans Neuenfels and not in the original Mozart opera that shows the hero laughing at the severed heads of the Prophet Mohammed, Jesus Christ and the Buddha.

A spokesman for the opera house said it would stage two performances of the opera later this year after receiving assurances from security authorities there would be no risk in involved.

City police are expected to mount a strong guard at the theatre if there are any demonstrations outside.

Germany's opera-loving Chancellor Angela Merkel led criticism of the theatre, but Germany's most senior Lutheran bishop, Wolfgang Huber of Berlin, criticised the decapitation scene as "not ideal."

Reviewers say the scene was a denunciation of all religions.