Pakistan: Cartoon contest hurts feelings of Muslims

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Pakistan's new foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi complained to his Dutch counterpart on Tuesday over a planned anti-Islam cartoon contest, saying "such acts spread hate and intolerance."

Far-right Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders has planned the contest for later in the year, featuring caricatures of the Muslim Prophet Mohammed.

In a statement released by the Pakistani foreign office, Qureshi said the planned event would hurt the feelings of Muslims around the world.

Dutch Foreign Minister Stef Blok attends a meeting with Egypt's Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry in Cairo, Egypt, May 10, 2018. /VCG Photo

Qureshi said later he planned to take up the issue with several world leaders. "We have raised this issue at several levels," he said. "We have contacted the United Nations. We have contacted the European Union."

A spokeswoman for Netherlands Foreign Minister Stef Block said Block had underlined during his phone conversation with Qureshi that the Dutch government did not endorse Wilders' initiative.

On Friday, Prime Minister Mark Rutte said it was difficult for him to see "what positive goal" Wilders hoped to accomplish, but the opposition lawmaker was exercising his rights under Dutch freedom of speech laws.

Dutch far-right politician Geert Wilders of the PVV party (Partij voor de Vrijheid) listens during a joint press conference with French and Czech far-right leaders during a conference of the rightwing Europe of Nations and Freedom (ENF) group in the European parliament, December 16, 2017. /VCG Photo

Pakistan's upper house of parliament on Monday condemned the contest. Prime Minister Imran Khan said: "They don't understand how much they hurt us when they do such acts."

An extremist Islamist party Tehreek-e-Labaik Pakistan is organizing a protest march against the contest on Wednesday.

The protesters are scheduled to march from the eastern city of Lahore to the capital Islamabad.

Wilders plans to hold the contest and display the cartoons on the walls of his political party's room in parliament. He says he's had "hundreds" of entries.

(Cover: Newly-appointed Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi addresses the media on his first day at the Foreign Ministry in Islamabad, August 20, 2018. /VCG Photo)

Source(s): Reuters