Pakistan Minister offers $100,000 reward for death of US filmmaker
A Pakistani Cabinet minister has today offered a US$100,000 reward for the death of the US filmmaker whose movie features a depiction of Islam’s Prophet Mohammed.
Railways Minister Ghulam Ahmad Bilor said he would pay the reward out of his own pocket.
He also urged the Taliban and al-Qaida to perform the “sacred duty” of helping locate and kill the filmmaker.
More than 20 people died yesterday in clashes with police in cities throughout the country.
The film has sparked violent protests throughout the Muslim world that resulted in the deaths of dozens, including the US ambassador to Libya.
Scores of people were injured today in a clash in Bangladesh’s capital between police and hundreds of demonstrators, as protests continued in the Muslim world against the film.
Police fired tear gas and used batons today to disperse the stone-throwing protesters, who were from about a dozen Islamic groups.
The protesters burned several vehicles in Dhaka, including a police van, witnesses said.
Dozens of protesters were arrested at the demonstration and inside the nearby National Press Club, where participants took refuge, a Dhaka Metropolitan Police official said.
Police and witnesses said scores of people were injured.
The clash erupted when authorities attempted to halt the demonstration, police said.
Authorities have banned all protests near the city’s main Baitul Mokarram mosque since yesterday, when more than 2,000 people marched and burned an effigy of President Barack Obama.
The protesters announced a nationwide general strike tomorrow to protest the police action.
In Pakistan, protests continued today, with more than 1,500 people, including women and children, rallying in Pakistan’s capital. The crowd was peaceful but angry over the release of the video called Innocence of Muslims, which portrays the Prophet Mohammed as a fraud, a womaniser and a child molester.
The protesters – from the Minhaj-ul-Quran religious group – marched through Islamabad’s streets and then gathered near Parliament, chanting slogans against the filmmaker and demanding stern punishment for him.
Thousands of people also protested today in Nigeria’s largest city, Kano. The crowd marched from a mosque to the palace of the Emir of Kano, the region’s top spiritual leader for Muslims.
About 200 students in Srinagar, the main city in Indian-controlled Kashmir, chanted “Down with America” and “Long live Islam” in a peaceful protest.
Some carried a placard that read: “There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his messenger.”
