The Copenhagen police is to stamp down hard on the current gang warfare between immigrant gangs and bikers, which has resulted in shootings, killings and knifings in the capital.

Innocent citizens have also been targeted by mistake and in some areas have had to accept gangs frisking them to find out whether they belong to one group or the other.

“We are going to stop this, and that is where we are initially concentrating our efforts,” says Copenhagen Police Assistant Commissioner Per Larsen.

To achieve their goals, police will be flooding difficult areas with officers of a special, dedicated 35-officer task force.

“We will be making it very plain to the various gangs that they don’t rule out there, we do. We will demonstrate very clearly that neither we nor the public will accept this behaviour,” Larsen says.

Police will also be strengthening their investigations into developments in the criminal environment – both in relation to existing cases and in the longer-term to determine criminal structures.

“This is an extremely difficult jigsaw puzzle,” Larsen says.