Bombed off

Flowerbomb, a perfume sold in a bottle the shape of a hand grenade, has been withdrawn from duty free shops at Oslo airport so that extremists will not be tempted to use it as a prop.

"We told the duty free operator that this kind of product was not wanted inside the airport," airport spokesman Jo Kobro said.

"The current regulations prohibit products in the shape of weapons and we think that this bottle could be used to scare passengers, just like a water gun could," he said Tuesday.

The decision came after a Norwegian passenger who was carrying a bottle of the perfume in her carry-on luggage was stopped by security officials at Beauvais airport, north of Paris.

The perfume is made by French cosmetics group L'Oreal.

"I'm surprised," a L'Oreal official in Oslo, Mathieu Spies, said. "The product has been on sale everywhere in the world for at least two years and we've never heard of this kind of a reaction," he said. I can understand that the bottle's design resembles a grenade but you only have to ask a question to find out what it contains."