Pakistan blocks social media access following anti-French protests

Supporters of Tehreek-e-Labiak Pakistan, a radical Islamist political party, chant slogans during a protest against the arrest of their party leader, Saad Rizvi, in Lahore, Pakistan (K.M. Chaudary/AP)

Pakistan blocked access to all social media, after days of anti-French protests across the country by radical Islamists opposed to cartoons they consider blasphemous.

Sites temporarily blocked on orders from the country’s interior ministry included Twitter and Facebook, said Khurram Mehran, a spokesman for Pakistan’s media regulatory agency.