Iranian paper aims for cartoon contest
BY NASSER KARIMI
ASSOCIATED PRESS
February 8, 2006
TEHRAN, Iran -- An Iranian newspaper said it would hold a competition for cartoons on the Holocaust to test whether the West extends the principle of freedom of expression to the Nazi genocide as it did to the caricatures of the Muhammad, the founder of Islam.
Meanwhile, about 50 protesters hurled firebombs and stones at the Norwegian Embassy in Iran's capital, the second straight day of violent protests against European missions in Tehran.
Hamshahri, one of Iran's largest papers, made clear the contest is a reaction to European newspapers' publication of Danish cartoons of Muhammad, which have led to demonstrations, boycotts and attacks on European embassies across the Islamic world. Several people have been killed.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack called the proposed contest outrageous.
The newspaper said the contest would be launched Monday and cosponsored by the House of Caricatures, a Tehran exhibition center for cartoons.
The paper and the cartoon center are owned by the Tehran Municipality, which is dominated by allies of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, well-known for his opposition to Israel.
Ahmadinejad, who was Tehran's mayor until being elected president in June, provoked outcries last year when he said on separate occasions that Israel should be wiped off the map and the Holocaust was a myth.
Elsewhere, protests and demonstrations continued Tuesday:
# Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen called the protests a global crisis.
# NATO peacekeepers in Afghanistan exchanged fire with protesters who attacked their base in a second straight day.
# Protests occurred in India, Pakistan, the Gaza Strip, Egypt, Nigeria and the Philippines.
Copyright © 2005 Detroit Free Press Inc.
