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Kamal al-Aalafi, editor-in-chief of the weekly Al Rai al Aam has been sentenced to a year in jail for reprinting Danish satirical caricatures of Islam’s Prophet Mohammed which provoked outrage among Muslims around the world earlier this year. The court also ordered the independent weekly to close for six months, his lawyer Khaled al-Ansi said. The cartoons, one of which depicted the Prophet Mohammed with a bomb in his turban, first appeared in Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten on September 30, 2005, sparking protests early in 2006 in which more than 50 people were killed in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

On January 26 and February 2, two Jordanian weeklies, al-Mihwar and Shihan, respectively, published the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad. The Jordanian editors said that their intent was to show that the cartoons were silly and thereby to calm, not provoke, popular anger. They denied any intent to promote hatred of Muslims.

On February 9, the Malaysian cabinet ordered the indefinite suspension of a regional daily, Sarawak Tribune, which had reprinted the cartoons on February 4. Malaysian authorities also have declared it an offense for anyone to publish, produce, import, circulate or possess the caricatures. Though protests against the caricatures in Malaysia have been peaceful, officials said that the paper had been insensitive and irresponsible and had contributed to public disorder. The paper fired the editor who had run the caricatures.

Meanwhile, the authorities in neighboring Indonesia ordered the withdrawal from sale of 3,000 copies of Peta, a tabloid weekly, in which the caricatures had also been reprinted. The police chief said he intended to prosecute the newspaper for “blasphemy.”

In Algeria, authorities reportedly have closed two newspapers and arrested their editors for printing the cartoons. Kamel Bousaad, director of Panorama weekly newspaper, was arrested on February 8 and Berkane Bouderbala, editor of the weekly Essafir and its weekly religious supplement Arrisala was arrested on February 11. Both publications have been closed.

The editors of two other Yemeni publications, The Yemen Observer and al-Hurriya, are facing similar charges though President Ali Abdallah Saleh has promised to scrap jail terms for journalists convicted of violations in publishing.
Muhammad al-Assadi is an editor of The Yemen Observer, an English-language paper owned by an adviser to Yemen’s president, condemned the cartoons but also lamented the way many Muslims reacted. “Muslims had an opportunity to educate the world about the merits of the Prophet Muhammad and the peacefulness of the religion he had come with. Muslims know how to lose, better than how to use, opportunities.” wrote Mr. Assadi, to illustrate his point, the editor published selections of the drawings. He denies the charges of offending Islam.

Kamal al-Aalafi says that he reprinted the cartoons, seen by many Muslims as blasphemous, to raise awareness among Yemenis about what had appeared in the Danish press, not to insult Muslims.
One year on from the publication of 12 cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, Danes are still trying to understand how the images led to the country’s biggest international crisis. Many Danes point the finger at a small group of extremist imams who travelled to Egypt and Lebanon to tell Muslims about the provocative pictures.
The Danish government has consistently argued the cartoon row was about freedom of expression. The prime minister, Mr Anders Fogh Rasmussen, is confident he handled the crisis correctly. “My conclusion is that freedom of speech is the most valuable right of liberty. We must defend it to the very last,” said Mr Rasmussen. -Source: BBC-

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