Pakistan rejects minister’s bounty

Pakistan yesterday distanced itself from a cabinet minister’s bounty for killing the maker of anti-Islam film Innocence of Muslims as protests against the movie continued from Turkey to Hong Kong.

A spokesman for Pakistani Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf rejected the $100,000 (€75,000) bounty promised by railways minister Ghulam Ahmed Bilour, who on Saturday offered a “prize” for killing the filmmaker and invited the Taliban and al-Qaeda to take part in the “noble deed”.

“This is not government policy. We completely dissociate (ourselves) from this,” the spokesman told AFP.

Fresh rallies were held across Pakistan yesterday to condemn the film after violent nationwide protests on Friday left 21 people dead.

More than 50 people have died in protests and attacks around the world linked to the low-budget film, which mocks Islam and the Prophet Mohammed, since the first demonstrations on Sept 11. Four US officials, including the ambassador to Libya, have been killed.

New protests yesterday also gripped Hong Kong, Turkey, Greece, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Bangladesh.

Some 3,000 demonstrators in Hong Kong briefly scuffled with police as they tried to deliver a letter to the US consulate.

“Freedom of speech should not be used against any religion,” said protester Saeed Uddin, who branded the film “malicious, disrespectful, and derogatory”.

Some 500 protesters in Istanbul burnt US and Israeli flags as they gathered around the Turkish city’s iconic Taksim Square, unfurling banners with slogans such as “Death to America”.

Greek police fired tear gas to disperse nearly 1,000 demonstrators in central Athens after some of them — largely immigrants from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Bangladesh — tried to break through a cordon to march towards the US embassy.

In Saudi Arabia, hundreds of people in a Shi’ite village in the kingdom’s Eastern Province demonstrated against the film, defying the country’s ban on protests.

Around 400 people rallied in front of the French embassy in Iran, shouting “Death to America”, “Death to Israel”, “Death to Britain”, and “Death to France”. No violence was reported, and the demonstration ended after around 90 minutes.

In Bangladesh, opposition parties enforced a nationwide protest strike, closing most schools, shops, and offices.

Israeli police said a Palestinian woman had tried to stab a policeman on an east Jerusalem street yesterday, apparently in protest at the film.

Meanwhile, an Islamist militant group claimed a cross-border attack on Israel from Egypt’s Sinai peninsula in protest at the film, a US-based monitoring agency said. Three attackers and one Israeli soldier were killed.