PARIS - A French newspaper reprinted on Wednesday a series of 12 Danish newspaper cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed that have sparked protests in the Muslim world and prompted Saudi Arabia to recall its ambassador from Denmark.
With a mounting diplomatic storm, calls for a boycott of Danish goods and flag-burning protests, Danish security police met Muslim religious leaders in a bid to contain any domestic reaction to cartoons first run by the Jyllands-Posten paper.
Police said they had won a pledge from Denmark’s imams to work to prevent an escalation of the row while the France Soir daily said it had published the cartoons in the name of freedom of expression and to fight religious intolerance.
“Because no religious dogma can impose its view on a democratic and secular society, France Soir publishes the incriminated cartoons,” the paper said.
Under a headline “Yes, we have the right to caricature God,” the paper ran a front page cartoon with Buddha, the Christian and Jewish Gods and the Prophet Mohammed sitting on a cloud above Earth, with the Christian God saying: “Don’t complain Mohammed, we’ve all been caricatured here.”
France Soir, which is in financial difficulties and looking for a buyer, devoted two inside pages to the Danish cartoons, with editor Serge Faubert unapologetic.
“Enough lessons from these reactionary bigots! There is nothing in these incriminated cartoons that intends to be racist or denigrate any community as such,” he wrote in a commentary.
With a mounting diplomatic storm, calls for a boycott of Danish goods and flag-burning protests, Danish security police met Muslim religious leaders in a bid to contain any domestic reaction to cartoons first run by the Jyllands-Posten paper.
Police said they had won a pledge from Denmark’s imams to work to prevent an escalation of the row while the France Soir daily said it had published the cartoons in the name of freedom of expression and to fight religious intolerance.
“Because no religious dogma can impose its view on a democratic and secular society, France Soir publishes the incriminated cartoons,” the paper said.
Under a headline “Yes, we have the right to caricature God,” the paper ran a front page cartoon with Buddha, the Christian and Jewish Gods and the Prophet Mohammed sitting on a cloud above Earth, with the Christian God saying: “Don’t complain Mohammed, we’ve all been caricatured here.”
France Soir, which is in financial difficulties and looking for a buyer, devoted two inside pages to the Danish cartoons, with editor Serge Faubert unapologetic.
“Enough lessons from these reactionary bigots! There is nothing in these incriminated cartoons that intends to be racist or denigrate any community as such,” he wrote in a commentary.
