The Cartoon Row

CAIRO, Feb. 14 (UPI) -- The European Union is debating ideas and measures that might be endorsed by the United Nations to bar the slandering of religions. EU foreign policy and security commissioner Javier Solana said after a meeting with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak Tuesday the EU and the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) "are considering certain ideas to safeguard and protect...

RIYADH, Feb 14 (Reuters) - In the anonymous world of the Internet, Saudi bloggers are attacking the government for its perceived role in stirring up Muslims around the world over cartoons satirising the Prophet Mohammad. Offering opinions mainly in English that no one would dare express in the state-controlled Saudi media, they accuse the U.S.-allied authorities of exploiting the cartoons months...

Iran, Syria and other governments that failed to protect foreign embassies from mobs protesting over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed should pay for the damage, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said. The cartoons' publication in a Danish newspaper have triggered widespread protests across the Muslim world including violent attacks on Western diplomatic offices in a number of countries. "The...

CALGARY -- As 40,000 copies of the Western Standard containing the controversial Prophet Mohammed cartoons rolled off the presses yesterday, the Calgary-based magazine's phones rang off the hook, excessive traffic crashed its website and its publisher entered the main ring of a media circus. Ezra Levant, publisher of the news and political magazine, spent the day defending his publication's...

The International Press Institute (IPI) has affirmed its support for the right of editors to have the final decision on content, while also calling on politicians to accept this principle when appealing for calm. IPI Director Johann P Fritz said, "I can fully understand that many people have been offended by the cartoons; however, there is an essential principle at stake, which goes to the core of...

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) has denounced the arrest of the publishers of Errissala (The Letter) and Essafir (The Ambassador) after they reprinted cartoons published by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Postens which have led to protests from Muslim communities around the world. The two weeklies were suspended. Last week the publisher of the weekly Iqra (Read) was jailed and the...

Feb. 13, 2006 issue - The worldwide uproar over the cartoon depictions of the Prophet Muhammad, printed in a Danish newspaper and reprinted across Europe, has little to do with what's in the headlines. In fact, those obscure the real–and critical–issues at stake. We read that the affair pits the strictures of Islam against Western freedom of expression. In fact, most Muslims are neither more nor...

Feb. 13, 2006 issue - Back in September 2005, the liberal Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published several cartoon depictions of the Prophet Muhammad–at least one as a terrorist–although any physical representation of the prophet is forbidden in Islam. There was no immediate backlash, but last week, after several other European newspapers reprinted the cartoons, the reaction went global. Muslims...

NEW YORK: As the crisis over the Danish cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad flared over the last two weeks, leaders of several American Muslim groups began working quietly to try to mediate between European Muslims and the West. The leaders - representing three national organizations and two mosques - say they share the outrage over the cartoons felt by Muslims in countries where riots have turned...

WASHINGTON, DC, United States (UPI) -- Several U.S. Muslim groups reportedly are playing a mediator role to calm Muslims elsewhere angered over the Danish cartoons of Prophet Mohammed. Leaders of the U.S. groups admit they share the outrage of other Muslims. But they also are telling other Muslims they must stop the violence in reverence to the prophet who would never have approved of their...