Protests continue over anti-Islam film

19 Sep 2012, 9:08 pm   -   Source: AAP
A female suicide car bomber has attacked a van in Kabul, killing 12 people. (AAP)

A female suicide car bomber has attacked a van in Kabul, killing 12 people. (AAP)

Protests are continuing over an anti-Islam film as France said it would close its embassies on Friday after a weekly printed cartoons of Prophet Mohammed.

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The Pakistan government is to declare Friday a national holiday in honour of Prophet Mohammed, officials say, in response to a US-made film deemed insulting to Islam.

The cabinet decided to make Friday an official "day of expression of love for the prophet" after discussing the Innocence of Muslims movie, which has triggered more than a week of violent protests across the Islamic world, a senior government official told AFP.

The decision was taken as up to 500 Pakistani lawyers managed to break through a gate to Islamabad's heavily-guarded diplomatic enclave on Wednesday in a fresh protest to denounce an American-made anti-Islam film.

Wearing headbands inscribed with "Lovers of Prophet, Death to the blasphemer, America's friends are traitors", the protesters chanted slogans including "We are ready to sacrifice our lives to safeguard honour of the prophet".

More than 200 riot police armed with batons and shields stood guard as the lawyers broke through the first of two gates leading to the enclave, which contains most Western embassies in the Pakistani capital.

The lawyers halted at the second gate, where their leaders delivered fiery speeches against the US, urging the Pakistan government to expel the American ambassador and break its "criminal silence" over the film.

A US flag was laid on the ground and the protesting lawyers walked over it one by one. Later they burned the flag.

More than 30 people have been killed in a week of attacks and violent protests linked to the controversial film, deemed insulting to the Prophet Mohammed.

Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan have all blocked access to YouTube, following the video-sharing website's failure to take down the film.

In Paris, the French government announced its embassies and schools in around 20 countries will be closed on Friday following the publication by a French newspaper of cartoons of Prophet Mohammed, the Foreign Ministry was quoted by Le Monde newspaper as saying.

Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told France Info radio that he had given instructions that "in all countries where that (the cartoons) could cause problems, we take particular security precautions."

Fabius said he was "worried" about the fallout of the cartoons, some of which show the prophet in compromising positions.

Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault also announced that a planned demonstration on Saturday in Paris over the film which sparked the initial protests last week, Innocence of Muslims, had been banned.

The director of the paper, whose offices were firebombed last year over Mohammed cartoons, defended the sketches, telling i-Tele channel the images would "shock those who want to be shocked in reading a paper they never read."

Security has been stepped up around the paper's central Paris offices.

On Wednesday morning Charlie Hebdo's website was inaccessible. It was not clear whether it had been hacked or crumpled under the weight of people trying to view it.

In Jakarta, the US government said on Wednesday it had temporarily closed its mission in Indonesia's third-largest city, Medan, because of continuing protests over an anti-Muslim film.

In Berlin, the head of Germany's Catholic Church and the country's interior minister both called on Wednesday for more respect for Muslim beliefs amid angry protests abroad at an anti-Islam video.

"It's part of freedom of opinion to respect the beliefs of others. That includes religious beliefs. The pain threshold is exceeded too often here in Germany," said Archbishop Robert Zollitsch of Freiburg, chairman of the national conference of Catholic bishops.

In his remarks to Bild newspaper, he also appealed to Muslims to reject fundamentalism, saying: "Killing in God's name is a sin."

Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich said in an N24 television interview: "One should think twice about causing such offence to people who find strength through their faith."

He echoed the bishop, saying grave offence had also been caused to "us Christians" by opponents asserting a right to freedom of opinion.

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