KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) – A rally by Pakistani students against a French satirical weekly’s latest publication of a Prophet Mohammad cartoon turned violent on Friday, with police firing warning shots and water cannons to disperse the demonstration. A photographer with the Agence France-Presse was shot and wounded in the melee.
Protesters took to the streets after midday prayers in the port city of Karachi, the eastern city of Lahore and the capital of Islamabad to protest Charlie Hebdo’s publishing this week of another cover depicting the prophet – an act deemed insulting to many followers of Islam.
The weekly’s new issue with a drawing of Muhammad, a tear rolling down his cheek and holding a placard that says “Je Suis Charlie” – a saying that has swept France and the world – was an act of defiance in the wake of last week’s terrorist attack at the paper’s Paris office that killed 12 people, including editors, cartoonists and two policemen.
Pakistan has condemned the Paris massacre but many people in this overwhelmingly Muslim country view the magazine’s prophet caricatures as a profound insult, and there have been scattered protests against the magazine around the country.
On Friday, clashes erupted in Karachi when the protesters started heading toward the French consulate. The protesters began throwing stones at the police, who tried to push them back with water cannons and tear gas.