20 000 rally against cartoons

2006-03-17 19:16

Lahore - More than 20 000 supporters of a radical Islamic group held a peaceful rally against the publication of Prophet Muhammad cartoons in an eastern Pakistan city on Friday, and accused the government of being "soft" on the West over the controversy.

"The government should have taken a hard stance against those countries where these cartoons were published to insult our beloved Prophet Muhammad," Hafiz Mohammed Saeed, the leader of Jamaat al-Dawat group, told the mass gathering at a park in the city.

Saeed is a renowned cleric and former leader of the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba Islamic militant group, which was banned by president Pervez Musharraf in 2002, in an effort to curb extremism and militancy.

Since then, Saeed has set up the Jamaat al-Dawat group, which mainly preaches Islam, runs seminaries and operates medical centres.

Violence left five dead

The government had recently put Saeed under house arrest for several days, to stop him from leading rallies against the cartoons, after a spate of violence during protests last month left five people dead.

On Friday, Saeed urged protesters to continue organising rallies to force the government to sever diplomatic ties with all countries where the cartoons, regarded by Muslims as blasphemous, were published.

"All Islamic countries should immediately boycott the products of such countries, and we will not tolerate any bad thing against Islam, the holy Quran and our beloved Prophet Muhammad," he said.

Saeed urged urges Muslim countries to form a body parallel to the United Nations.

"Since the UN has failed to protect our interests, we demand that the Muslim world should form a United Nations of Muslims," he said.

- AP