Oct. 3 (Bloomberg) -- The director of Berlin's Deutsche Oper, criticized for canceling performances of an opera on concern that it may offend Muslims, said she will reinstate the production when security authorities give clearance.

Kirsten Harms told a panel debate at the opera house that she'll bring back Hans Neuenfels's production of Mozart's ``Idomeneo'' once Berlin's Interior Ministry ``gives a new assessment of the security situation.''

The production's final scene shows a blood-spattered King Idomeneo carrying the severed heads of Poseidon, Jesus, Buddha and Mohammed. Security officials had warned her in August that the production presented an ``incalculable security risk.'' The police have since said that they received no concrete threat.

Harms's announcement on Sept. 25 that she was canceling four November performances prompted criticism from politicians including Chancellor Angela Merkel and Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, who said the cancellation was a blow for artistic freedom and a dangerous precedent.

Deutsche Oper will also ask Berlin Interior Senator Ehrhart Koerting for a ``security concept'' to protect the opera house's staff and audiences before reviving the Neuenfels production, Harms said. With 1,865 seats, Deutsche Oper is the biggest of Berlin's three opera houses and Germany's second largest.

```Idomeneo' can come back to the Deutsche Oper in the next few months,'' Koerting told the panel, admitting he had made a mistake in suggesting to Harms in August that she drop the opera from her program because it was a security risk.

``I reacted by worrying too much about security,'' Koerting said. ``That was perhaps a mistake. But it's better to have too much security than too little.''

To contact the reporter on this story: Catherine Hickley at chickley@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: October 3, 2006 09:30 EDT