International

UNITED NATIONS, Feb. 27 (UPI) -- A soft-spoken man who bears the weight of global problems traveled from New York to Doha, Qatar, this past weekend to plea for calm dialogue among civilizations in face of deadly riots in reaction to cartoon caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan saw in a high-level meeting Sunday of the Alliance of Civilizations a venue for that...

Today, an online newspaper with links to Michigan State University’s journalism program became the first news outlet in the state to publish controversial Danish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad. The online publication drew immediate complaints from local Muslims and the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Dawud Walid, Michigan director for the group. Calling the cartoons offensive...

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – EU foreign ministers on Monday (27 February) changed the wording of a statement on the Danish cartoon row at the insistence of Dutch foreign minister Bernard Bot, who wanted to avoid the suggestion of an EU apology towards the Muslim world. Meeting in Brussels, the ministers issued a fresh statement on the violence that recently erupted in some muslim countries following...

The Oulu-based Finnish cultural magazine Kaltio fired its editor Jussi Vilkuna after he refused to remove a cartoon on its website featuring Prophet Muhammad wearing a mask and discussing freedom of speech with a cartoonist. The controversial cartoon has since been removed from the magazine's website. After the posting of the cartoon, many permanent advertisers including the Finnish insurance...

Volgograd, February 27, Interfax - The first issue of a newspaper, which is to replace the closed Gorodskiye Vesti, will be released in Volgograd on Tuesday. Gorodskiye Vesti was closed for publishing a religious cartoon. The lower Volga department of the federal service monitoring media compliance with the law and protecting cultural heritage registered the new paper, Volgogradskaya Gazeta, on...

The Committee to Protect Journalists has condemned the Malaysian government's suspension for two weeks of the publishing permit of the Chinese-language Berita Petang Sarawak newspaper for reprinting controversial cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed. The cartoons accompanied a February 4 article headlined, "We are prepared for the jihad war," the official government news agency Bernama said in...

Chief Russian media figures have made an open statement against the closure of a newspaper that had published a picture of Jesus Christ, Moses, Buddha and Mohammed. Administration members of MediaSoyuz, the union of Russian journalists, have said in their statement published by Vremya Novostei newspaper on Sunday that the situation should be considered "in the sphere of journalist ethics...

KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 25 (Bernama) -- The Internal Security Ministry on Saturday suspended for two weeks effective tomorrow the publishing permit of Berita Petang Sarawak newspaper for publishing a seditious article in Chinese which also carried the offensive caricatures of Prophet Muhammad. Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, who is also Internal Security Minister, decided to suspend the...

HERE in Denmark the Muhammad cartoon issue continues to dominate the headlines. Politiken, the paper we get at home, has been running a special report on Egypt’s role in communicating the matter to other Islamic countries and international Islamic organizations, as well as warning the Danish government. Thus the paper has helped throw new light on the development of the affair, including to which...

MINSK, BELARUS - A small independent newspaper in Belarus has reprinted the cartoons of Prophet Muhammad that set off violent riots across the Muslim world, an editor said this week. The government condemned the publication and said it was not in line with its policy. The European Union's representative to Sudan said the controversy over the prophet drawings sparked attacks on foreign aid workers...