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European papers provoke Muslims
Outrage over insulting caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) spread across the Muslim world on Thursday, with protestors in Pakistan shouting "Death to Denmark" and calls growing for European governments to apologise.
- Gulf News Report
- Published: 23:32 May 3, 2009
Dubai: Outrage over insulting caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) spread across the Muslim world on Thursday, with protestors in Pakistan shouting "Death to Denmark" and calls growing for European governments to apologise.
Anger over the controversy mounted after several newspapers across Europe reprinted the caricatures yesterday, including Fran-ce's Le Monde.
The French-Egyptian owner of the daily France Soir, which ran the cartoons on Wednesday, sacked the paper's managing editor overnight and issued a written apology to Muslims, though the editor challenged the dismissal afterwards.
Two Palestinian groups, the Al Aqsa Martyrs Bri-gades and the Popular Resistance Committee, warned they would target nationals of Denmark, Norway and France and destroy the countries' local offices unless they closed. Norway immediately shut down its West Bank mission.
A group of Palestinian gunmen also briefly took up positions outside the EU Commission's office in Gaza, demanding apologies, AFP reported.
In Pakistan, protesters staged fiery demonstrations in major cities, burning an effigy of Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Danish and French flags.
As a firestorm of indignation swept the Islamic world, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak warned that in reprinting the cartoons European papers risked providing "further excuses to the forces of radicalism and terrorism".
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also joined the criticism. "Muslims should display firm reaction to such disgraceful acts," he was quoted by agencies as saying in a phone conversation with Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz of Saudi Arabia.
Even as the protests peaked, Rasmussen invited foreign ambassadors in Denmark to discuss the government's stand on the controversy today. Rasmussen had previously declined a similar request by 11 Muslim diplomats.
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