Mark
01-02-06, 16:12
Protests rage; Sudan boycotts Danish products
Web posted at: 2/1/2006 3:6:23
Source ::: Agencies
A sign reading ‘No Danish Products’ hangs at a supermarket in Amman, Jordan, yesterday.
GAZA CITY: Thousands of Palestinians demonstrated yesterday at the urging of the radical faction Islamic Jihad to denounce caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) that appeared in Danish and Norwegian publications.
A large picture of Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen was set alight during the protest outside the UN compound in Gaza City. Angry protestors also torched pictures of Israel’s Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and US President George W Bush while gunmen fired the customary volleys of bullets into the air.
“This barbarous offensive on Islam is the result of a campaign of incitement against Islam waged by Bush,” Nafez Azzam, a Jihad leader, told reporters. Dozens of people, including two Arab Israeli MPs and leaders of the Israeli Islamist movement, also demonstrated outside the Danish embassy in Tel Aviv.
“It is forbidden to harm the Prophet (PBUH) and the symbols of Islam ... We are ready to die for our Prophet (PBUH),” the demonstrators shouted before submitting a petition and demanding a formal apology from the Danish government.
On Monday, dozens of gunmen demonstrated outside the EU offices in Gaza to protest against the controversial caricatures. The protests led Denmark to evacuate all its nationals from the Gaza Strip and recommend those in the occupied West Bank to also leave.
Meanwhile, Sudan has turned down a visit by Denmark’s defence minister and urged all firms to boycott Danish products over the publication of cartoons deemed offensive to Islam, the official news agency Suna reported yesterday.
“We have rejected a request by the Danish defence minister to visit Sudan in protest at the publication by a Danish newspaper insulting Prophet Mohammed (PBUH),” Suna quoted Defence Minister Abdel Rahim Mohammed Hussein as saying.
“Sudan’s position is based on its rejection of blasphemy against Islam and any other heavenly faiths,” he added. Scores of Arab countries, institutions and organisations have called for a boycott of Danish products as the Muslim outcry over the publication in a Danish newspaper of cartoons of the Prophet (PBUH) snowball into a major diplomatic crisis.
Suna also reported that the foreign ministry had urged “all Sudanese companies and institutions to stop importing Danish products and halt all financial transactions”. Norway and Sweden also found themselves embroiled in one of the most serious such incidents to have involved Scandinavian countries in recent years after a Norwegian magazine reprinted the cartoons and a Swedish daily expressed support. Purported Iraqi militants also called in an Internet statement for attacks against any Danish or Norwegian target.
Web posted at: 2/1/2006 3:6:23
Source ::: Agencies
A sign reading ‘No Danish Products’ hangs at a supermarket in Amman, Jordan, yesterday.
GAZA CITY: Thousands of Palestinians demonstrated yesterday at the urging of the radical faction Islamic Jihad to denounce caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) that appeared in Danish and Norwegian publications.
A large picture of Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen was set alight during the protest outside the UN compound in Gaza City. Angry protestors also torched pictures of Israel’s Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and US President George W Bush while gunmen fired the customary volleys of bullets into the air.
“This barbarous offensive on Islam is the result of a campaign of incitement against Islam waged by Bush,” Nafez Azzam, a Jihad leader, told reporters. Dozens of people, including two Arab Israeli MPs and leaders of the Israeli Islamist movement, also demonstrated outside the Danish embassy in Tel Aviv.
“It is forbidden to harm the Prophet (PBUH) and the symbols of Islam ... We are ready to die for our Prophet (PBUH),” the demonstrators shouted before submitting a petition and demanding a formal apology from the Danish government.
On Monday, dozens of gunmen demonstrated outside the EU offices in Gaza to protest against the controversial caricatures. The protests led Denmark to evacuate all its nationals from the Gaza Strip and recommend those in the occupied West Bank to also leave.
Meanwhile, Sudan has turned down a visit by Denmark’s defence minister and urged all firms to boycott Danish products over the publication of cartoons deemed offensive to Islam, the official news agency Suna reported yesterday.
“We have rejected a request by the Danish defence minister to visit Sudan in protest at the publication by a Danish newspaper insulting Prophet Mohammed (PBUH),” Suna quoted Defence Minister Abdel Rahim Mohammed Hussein as saying.
“Sudan’s position is based on its rejection of blasphemy against Islam and any other heavenly faiths,” he added. Scores of Arab countries, institutions and organisations have called for a boycott of Danish products as the Muslim outcry over the publication in a Danish newspaper of cartoons of the Prophet (PBUH) snowball into a major diplomatic crisis.
Suna also reported that the foreign ministry had urged “all Sudanese companies and institutions to stop importing Danish products and halt all financial transactions”. Norway and Sweden also found themselves embroiled in one of the most serious such incidents to have involved Scandinavian countries in recent years after a Norwegian magazine reprinted the cartoons and a Swedish daily expressed support. Purported Iraqi militants also called in an Internet statement for attacks against any Danish or Norwegian target.