{"id":13315,"date":"2018-08-30T22:23:53","date_gmt":"2018-08-30T22:23:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=13315"},"modified":"2018-08-30T22:23:53","modified_gmt":"2018-08-30T22:23:53","slug":"geert-wilders-cancels-prophet-muhammad-cartoon-contest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=13315","title":{"rendered":"Geert Wilders cancels Prophet Muhammad cartoon contest"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Geert Wilders, an anti-Islam opposition leader in the Netherlands, has cancelled a competition for cartoons depicting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad that sparked protests in Pakistan.<\/p>\n

The far-right politician, who is known for his incendiary speeches and protests against immigration and Islam,<\/span>\u00a0said on Thursday he did not want others endangered by the contest he planned for November.<\/p>\n

“To avoid the risk of victims of Islamic violence, I have decided not to let the cartoon contest go ahead,” he said in a written statement, claiming to have received death threats.<\/p>\n

The scheduled contest sparked angry protests in Pakistan and a death threat this week from a 26-year-old man, reportedly a Pakistani, who was arrested on Tuesday in The Hague.<\/p>\n

Earlier on Thursday, a Dutch judge extended by two weeks the detention of the man who allegedly threatened to attack Wilders.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors said in a statement that an investigating judge ordered the suspect held while he is investigated on charges of making a threat, making preparations for a murder and incitement.<\/p>\n

Stijn van Kessel, a political scientist at Queen Mary University of London, told Al Jazeera that\u00a0the competition was a tactic by Wilders to\u00a0<\/span>get media attention in the face of waning public support.<\/p>\n

“He is not truly interested in a cartoon contest but this is a way for him to generate media attention; he hopes that will eventually translate to votes,” Kessel said.<\/p>\n

Deeply offensive<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Physical depictions of the prophet are forbidden in Islam and deeply offensive to Muslims.<\/p>\n

In Pakistan, thousands of people angered over Wilders’ plans marched towards the capital, Islamabad, on Thursday.<\/p>\n

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Pakistan’s government has vowed to protest the contest at the UN[The Associated Press]<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

About 10,000 supporters of the Tehreek-i-Labaik Pakistan party set out on the march on Wednesday, calling on the government to cut diplomatic ties with the Netherlands.<\/p>\n

Pakistan’s government had vowed to protest the contest at the United Nations.<\/p>\n

The Dutch government has distanced itself from the competition, with Prime Minister Mark Rutte clarifying that Wilders, leader of the opposition Freedom Party,\u00a0<\/span>is not a member of the government.<\/p>\n

Wilders announced the contest in June and claimed to had received 200 entries so far. The winner was supposed to receive a cash prize.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\n SOURCE: Al Jazeera and news agencies<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Geert Wilders, an anti-Islam opposition leader in the Netherlands, has cancelled a competition for cartoons depicting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad that sparked protests in Pakistan. The far-right politician, who is known for his incendiary speeches and protests against immigration and Islam,\u00a0said on Thursday he did not want others endangered by the contest he planned for November.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":13316,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}