From Nigeria to Athens, Muslim protests rumble on

Demonstrations in Nigeria, Iran, Greece and Turkey show that anger over anti-Islam film, cartoons has not dissipated.

By REUTERS
Egyptians protest at US embassy 390 (photo credit: Mohamed Abd El Ghany / Reuters)
Egyptians protest at US embassy 390
(photo credit: Mohamed Abd El Ghany / Reuters)
DUBAI - Muslims protested in Nigeria, Iran, Greece and Turkey on Sunday to show anti-Western anger against a film and cartoons insulting Islam had not dissipated.
As delegates from around the world gathered in New York for a UN General Assembly where the clash between free speech and blasphemy is bound to be raised, US flags were once again burning in parts of the Muslim world.
Iranian students chanted "Death to America" and "Death to Israel" outside the French embassy in Tehran in protest at the decision by satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo to publish cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, days after widespread protests - some deadly - against a film made in the United States.
Shi'ite Muslims in the Nigerian town of Katsina burned US, French and Israeli flags and a religious leader called for protests to continue until the makers of the film and cartoons are punished.
In Pakistan, where fifteen people were killed in protests on Friday, a government minister has offered $100,000 to anyone who kills the maker of the short, amateurish video "The Innocence of Muslims".
Calls have increased for a UN measure outlawing insults to Islam and blasphemy in general.
In Athens, some protesters hurled bottles of water, stones and shoes at police who responded with teargas. Calm returned when demonstrators interrupted the protest to pray.
Western embassies remain on alert
Protests around the world were relatively small and calm, but Western embassies remained on alert after the US ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed in one of the first protests, on Sept. 11.
The upsurge of Muslim anger - just weeks before US elections - have caused  a setback to President Barack Obama's efforts to keep the "Arab Spring" revolutions from fueling a new wave of anti-Americanism.
In US ally Turkey, a secular Muslim state often seen as a bridge between the Islamic world and the West, protesters set fire to US and Israeli flags on Sunday. "May the hands that touch Mohammad break," chanted some 200 protesters before peacefully dispersing.
"We will certainly not allow uncontrolled protests, but we will not just grin and bear it when Islam's prophet is insulted," Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan told party members at the weekend.
"The protests in the Muslim world must be measured, and the West should show a determined stance against Islamophobia."