Cartoon row update :Global protest continues stuns world/ Pictures

General Duke · February 6, 2006

New protests erupt in cartoon row

Monday 06 February 2006, 21:49 Makka Time, 18:49 GMT

Iranians were stopped from storming the Austrian embasseis.

Fresh protests have erupted across Asia and the Middle East over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, despite calls by world leaders for calm after Danish diplomatic missions were set ablaze in Lebanon and Syria.

On Monday Kofi Annan, the UN secretary-general, expressed alarm and urged restraint, but oil giant Iran, which is reviewing trade ties with countries that published the cartoons, vowed to respond to what it called "an anti-Islamic and Islamophobic current".

In Tehran on Monday, about 200 people pelted the embassy of Austria, the current EU president, with petrol bombs and stones over the cartoons and Iran's nuclear confrontation with the West. The mission did not catch fire and police prevented people from storming it.

Further demonstrations were planned for later on Monday outside the Danish and Norwegian embassies in Tehran.

Denmark has been the focus of Muslim rage as the images, one showing the Prophet Muhammad with a turban resembling a bomb, first appeared in a Danish daily. Muslims in the Gulf Arab region have intensified a boycott of Danish goods.

Middle way?

The furore has developed into a clash between press freedom and religious respect, with many advocating a middle way.

For Muslims, depicting the prophet is prohibited by Islam, but moderate Muslim groups, while condemning publication of the cartoons and bridling at what they see as provocation, expressed fears about extremists hijacking the affair.

Countries where the controversial cartoons have been printed so far:

Ukraine, Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Hungary, New Zealand, Poland, the United States, Japan, Norway, Malaysia, Australia, Jordan and Morrocco

Philippe Douste-Blazy, the French foreign minister said, in a view echoed by other leaders after the weekend riots in Beirut and Damascus: "I call on all Arab countries to talk with moderation about what is happening. Let's keep it calm."

Ukraine became the 18th country where papers published the cartoons, joining Bulgaria, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Hungary, New Zealand, Poland, the US, Japan, Norway, Malaysia, Australia, Jordan and Morrocco.

Furious Muslims once again took to the streets on Monday. One protester was killed in Afghanistan in clashes with police. Another person died at the weekend when flames forced him to jump from the burning Danish consulate in Beirut.

Call for execution

Speaking from Beirut, Omar Bakri Mohammad, leader of the Islamist group Al-Muhajiroon which is banned in Britain, called for those who blaspheme against the prophet to be executed.

"In Islam, God said, and the messenger Mohammad said, whoever insults a prophet, he must be punished and executed," he told BBC radio by telephone.

Britain issued a stern warning after a small group of protesters caused a storm by marching in London with placards threatening beheadings and bloodshed.

Chirac phoned the Danish PM

to express solidarity

"The attacks on the citizens of Denmark and the people of other European countries are completely unacceptable as is the behaviour of some of the demonstrators in London over the last few days," it said in a statement.

Moderate Muslim groups as well as Western leaders condemned the weekend violence and calls to arms and urged calm.

The prime ministers of Turkey and Spain, in an opinion piece for the International Herald Tribune newspaper, said: "With growing concern, we are witnessing the escalation in disturbing tensions."

"We shall all be the losers if we fail to immediately defuse this situation, which can only leave a trail of mistrust and misunderstanding between both sides in its wake," Tayyip Erdogan and Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said in the joint article, adding, "Let the voice of reason be heard."

Iran's approach

But Iran, which has withdrawn its ambassador from Denmark, saw things differently, saying the cartoons "launched an anti-Islamic and Islamophobic current which will be answered".

In Tehran, Golamhossein Elham, the Iranian government spokesman, said: "It was an ugly measure. The Islamic republic of Iran is prepared to sacrifice its life for its belief in Islam and the honour of the Holy Prophet."

Police fired on protesters in

Afghanistan, killing one

Manouchehr Mottaki, Iran's foreign minister, called for an emergency meeting of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference to discuss what he called Islamophobia in the West.

Meanwhile, Iran's largest selling newspaper, Hamshahri, announced it would be holding a contest on cartoons of the Holocaust in response to the publishing in European papers of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.

All day Monday there was a flurry of public statements as well as behind-the-scenes diplomatic activity to prevent divisions deepening between Muslim countries and the West.

Jacques Chirac, the French president, telephoned Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Danish prime minister, on Monday to express solidarity with Denmark and to examine how to calm the situation.

European Union ambassadors meet on Monday to examine diplomatic options to try and defuse the tensions. Lebanon apologised to Denmark for the burning of its consulate. More than 300 people have so far been arrested.

Travel warning

Denmark advised its citizens to leave Lebanon and Syria and warned against travelling to other Middle Eastern destinations.

Chechnya's pro-Moscow government on Monday banned Danish humanitarian organisations from the shattered region.

There were new protests outside EU offices in Gaza on Monday and in several nations including Finland. In Afghanistan, one man was shot dead in clashes between protesters and police.

Other protests took place in India, Indonesia and Thailand.

General Duke · February 6, 2006

Danish embassy in Tehran attacked

Staff and agencies

Monday February 6, 2006

Iranian protesters burn Danish and French flags in front of the Austrian embassy in Tehran. Photograph: Vahid Salemi/AP

Hundreds of angry protesters threw stones and firebombs at the Danish embassy in Tehran today to protest against the publication of cartoons of the prophet Muhammad.

Police had encircled the embassy building but were unable to hold back up to 400 demonstrators as they pelted the mission with stones and incendiary devices.

So far the protesters have not breached the police cordon to get inside the structure, but they managed to throw a handful of firebombs over the building's high outer wall. The embassy had already been evacuated.

The Bush administration today condemned the violent protests against the cartoons that have taken place around the world and urged governments to take steps to lower tensions.

"We understand fully why people, why Muslims, find the cartoons offensive, and we've also spoken out about the importance of the right for people to express their views and freedom of speech in society," the White House spokesman, Scott McClellan, said.

"Those who disagree with the views that were expressed certainly have the right to condemn them but they should be peaceful and we urge constructive dialogue about this difficult issue."

The caricatures were first published in Denmark in September and have since been republished in other newspapers in Europe and elsewhere. Muslims consider any images of the prophet to be blasphemous. One of the cartoons featured Muhammad with a bomb in his turban.

Some 200 Iranian student demonstrators also threw stones at the Austrian embassy in Tehran, breaking some windows and starting small fires. Austria was targeted because it currently holds the rotating presidency of the EU. Members of the Iranian parliament issued a statement warning that those who published the cartoons should remember the case of Salman Rushdie.

The late Iranian leader issued a "fatwa", or religious edict, in 1989 calling for Rushdie's death following the publication of his novel The Satanic Verses, which some Muslims found blasphemous.

Iranian radio and television also reported a series of boycotts of Danish medical equipment and consumer goods, and the suspension of trade negotiations with Denmark.

In Afghanistan, two protesters were shot dead and three other people, including two police officials, were injured in the central city of Mihtarlam when police fired on hundreds of demonstrators, an interior ministry spokesman, Dad Mohammed Rasa, said.

Meanwhile, Syria apologised to Chile after a mob set fire to the Chilean embassy in Damascus on Saturday while attacking the Danish embassy, which is in the same building.

In Romania, the country's main press organisation today urged all media not to publish the cartoons, and in Chechnya, the pro-Russian government banned Danish humanitarian organisations from the war-torn Muslim region in protest against the pictures.

Demonstrators threw stones at EU offices in the Gaza Strip and pulled down the EU flag.

In Yemen, a small newspaper, al-Hurriya, was closed down and its editor arrested for printing the caricatures, while in Warsaw, the editor of Rzeczpospolita - a Polish newspaper that reprinted the images - said that he was sorry if the publication had caused offence to Muslims, but defended it as an act of solidarity.

In Jordan, a majority of parliamentarians demanded that the government cancel agreements with Denmark, Norway, New Zealand and other nations where the drawings were published.

In Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, police fired warning shots to stop protesters from ripping a plaque from the wall of the US consulate in Surabaya, the country's second largest city, witnesses said. Hundreds of demonstrators threw rocks at the Danish consulate in the city before moving on to the US consulate.

In India, riot police fired tear gas and water cannons to disperse hundreds of student protesters who burned Danish flags and chanted slogans in New Delhi. Dozens of protesters torched Danish flags, burned tyres and shouted slogans in several parts of Srinagar, Kashmir, police said.

In Bangkok, about 400 members of Thailand's Muslim minority shouted "God is Great" outside Denmark's embassy, and some demonstrators stamped on a Danish flag.

In Malaysia, an editor of a newspaper that ran one of the drawings to accompany an article about the lack of impact of the controversy inside the country resigned, according to a statement seen Monday.