COPENHAGEN - The Danish embassy in Vienna on Wednesday received a letter containing an unidentified white powder, a day after a similar envelope which turned out to be harmless was sent to the Danish mission in Sweden, the foreign ministry said.
The letter in Vienna was submitted to Austrian authorities, the ministry said.
"All the Danish missions abroad have been instructed to exercise caution when handling the mail they receive, and to contact local authorities" if they have any doubts about their contents, the ministry said.
On Tuesday, the Danish embassy in Stockholm was evacuated after an employee discovered a letter containing an unidentified powder.
Rescue teams put embassy staff through decontamination procedures as a precautionary measure, but tests on Wednesday showed that the powder was harmless, Swedish police said.
Following the September 2001 attacks in the United States, a wave of anthrax alerts were recorded around the world, including in Denmark, one of the staunchest US allies in the war on Iraq.
Most of the alerts turned out to be hoaxes, though five people died and 17 were infected in the United States after handling anthrax-laced letters.
Anthrax is a bacteria which can be deadly if inhaled. Symptoms include fever, sweat, and chills, but typically they do not manifest themselves for several days.
05/11/2005 14:14 GMT