Thousands of Pakistanis rally in Karachi to condemn anti-Islamic French cartoons

Tens of thousands of protesters rallied in Pakistan's biggest city on Saturday as anger grows in the Muslim-majority country over the French defence of the republication Charlie Hebdo cartoons insulting the Prophet Mohammed and Islamic values. Activists from the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) party and residents of the port city of Karachi marched in the streets to push the Pakistani government to end ties with France and boycott French products. Protesters trampled on images of French President Emmanuel Macron, burned French flags and held slogans expressing their regrets over anti-Islamic French cartoons hurting Muslim sentiments. 'We demand the government take steps to boycott France and expel its ambassador from the country,' Zubair Kasuri, a spokesperson for the TLP, told dpa. Prime Minister Imran Khan also argues that Europeans have shown a lack of understanding for the fact that Muslims cannot accept visual depictions of their prophet. As a part of anti-Islamic policies, Macron defended the right of Islamophobic French magazine Charlie Hebdo to publish offensive caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed. Pakistan, a 220-million strong nation with an overwhelmingly Muslim population, held the nationwide protests when a Islamophobic movie insulting the Prophet Mohammed was uploaded on YouTube in 2012.