Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday accused French President Emmanuel Macron of “attacking Islam” after the European leader criticized Islamists and defended the publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad.
Khan’s comments follow statements Macron made last week after a French teacher was beheaded near Paris after he showed cartoons of the Prophet during a class he led on freedom of expression.
Macron said the teacher “was assassinated because the Islamists want our future.”
In a series of tweets, Khan said the comment would sow division.
“This is a time when Pres Macron could have put a healing touch and denied space to extremists instead of creating further polarization and marginalization that inevitably leads to radicalization,” Khan wrote.
“It is regrettable that he has chosen to promote Islamophobia by attacking Islam rather than the terrorists who carry out the violence, be they Muslims, white supremacists or Nazi ideologues.
Macron already generated controversy earlier this month when he said that “Islam is a religion that is in crisis throughout the world.”
The French teacher became the target of an online hate campaign for his choice of lesson material – the same images that sparked a bloody assault by Islamist gunmen at the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, the original editor , in January 2015.
Muhammad cartoons are forbidden by Islam.
Blasphemy is an explosive topic in ultra-conservative Pakistan, where anyone who is seen as having insulted Islam or Islamic figures can face the death penalty.
“By attacking Islam, clearly without having any understanding of it, President Macron has attacked and hurt the feelings of millions of Muslims in Europe and around the world,” Khan said.
In a speech to the United Nations last month, Khan, a populist leader known for playing with Pakistan’s hardline religious base, criticized Charlie Hebdo for republishing the cartoons, saying “willful provocations” should be ” universally prohibited “.
Several Muslim countries have called for a boycott of French products.
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