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Pak parliament condemns Prophet's cartoons
Pakistan's parliament has condemned cartoons depicting Islam's prophet in European newspapers.
Members of Pakistan's parliament on Friday condemned cartoons depicting Islam's prophet in European newspapers.
Several lawmakers criticized the caricatures in speeches in parliament, and legislators planned to meet on Tuesday to pass a resolution condemning the drawings that were igniting protests throughout the Muslim world.
"We will not tolerate the publication of such blasphemous cartoons. We condemn them," said Senator Khurshid Ahmed.
A coalition of hard-line Islamic parties was planning street protests in major Pakistani cities later on Friday against the cartoons.
One of the caricatures shows the Prophet Mohammad wearing a turban shaped as a bomb with a burning fuse.
Islamic tradition bars any depiction of the prophet to prevent idolatry.
Pakistan is a deeply conservative Muslim nation, and anyone insulting Muhammad or Islam's holy book, the Quran, can be sentenced to death.
The drawings first ran in Denmark's largest broadsheet, Jyllands-Posten, in September.
They were reprinted on Wednesday in France Soir and several other European papers rallying to defend freedom of expression.
Wasim Sajjad, the leader of the house in Pakistan's Senate, assured lawmakers that the government has lodged a protest with Denmark over "blasphemous cartoons."
He said the Senate on Tuesday "will move and pass a resolution to unanimously condemn" the pictures.
