Violence over ‘repulsive’ film inexcusable: Gillard

Protesters burn a US flag during a protest against an anti-Islam film in front of the US embassy in Ankara yesterday

Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard yesterday condemned as “repulsive” a film mocking Islam that has triggered global protests but said the violent demonstrations seen in Sydney were inexcusable.
Six police officers and a number of protesters were injured after a snap demonstration against the film involving several hundred people turned violent in central Sydney on Saturday.
Police fired pepper spray to contain a group trying to gain entry to the US consulate in Sydney and two demonstrators were bitten by police dogs during the ensuing fracas.
Police said six people had been charged over the demonstration, which was among several to be held worldwide in response to the amateur film ridiculing the Prophet that was produced in the US.
Gillard described the video as “truly repulsive” and said Australia valued freedom of and respect for all religions.
“But the making of that video does not justify violent conduct, and I absolutely condemn the violence that we have seen on Sydney streets,” she said.
The scenes evoked uncomfortable memories of alcohol-fuelled race riots on the city’s Cronulla beach in December 2005 linked to tensions with the Islamic community, and police urged calm.
“This is not an enormous event, this is a protest that turned violent, nothing more,” police commissioner Andrew Scipione told reporters.
“Of the 300 or 400 or so that were there protesting overall there was but a relative few who caused most of the trouble.
Gillard added her voice to the calls for peace. “I do note that senior Islamic leaders have condemned this violence in as strong terms as I have, and Australians should recognise that,” she said.
In cities across the Muslim world protesters have vented their fury at the US-made film ‘Innocence of Muslims’, targeting symbols of US influence ranging from embassies and schools to fast food chains.
The worst violence linked to the anti-Islam film saw the US ambassador to Libya and three other Americans killed late Tuesday by suspected Islamic militants who fired rocket-propelled grenades at the US consulate in Benghazi.
In Paris, France’s interior minister said yesterday he will prevent any further anti-US demonstrations.
The warning came a day after police in Paris detained around 150 people for taking part in an unauthorised, impromptu protest near the US embassy that saw three officers slightly hurt after a number of clashes.
“I have issued instructions so that this does not happen again,” Interior Minister Manuel Valls told France 2 television. “These protests are forbidden. Any incitement to hatred must be fought with the greatest firmness.”
Valls said that among the roughly 250 protesters on Saturday there were some groups that “advocate radical Islam”, but they were not representative of the moderate Islam practised by most Muslims in France.
France is home to Europe’s largest Islamic community, with at least 4mn Muslims in the country.
Meanwhile, a small group of protesters burned a US flag outside the US embassy in Turkey’s capital Ankara yesterday while several dozen others chanted slogans against US policy in Syria.
The protesters from two separate groups, one an Islamist organisation and the other a workers’ party, carried banners including one which read “Murderer America! Get out of Turkey!”
Riot police backed by water cannon blocked the road outside the embassy, keeping the protesters around 100m from its walls, and the group dispersed in less than an hour.
Turkey’s ruling A K Party, in power for the past decade, has Islamist roots but the country has a strong secular tradition and protests against the US have been peaceful and on a far smaller scale than in other parts of the Middle East.
Yesterday’s protest coincided with a visit to Turkey by General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is expected to discuss the crisis in neighbouring Syria and Turkey’s domestic security with his Turkish counterparts.
Meanwhile, Belgian police said yesterday they have detained 230 people in the northern city of Antwerp after clashes at a demonstration against the film.
The protesters shouted anti-US slogans, and some also set fire to the US flag, according to television footage of Saturday’s unauthorised demonstration in an area that has a large Muslim population.
It degenerated into clashes with police after officers blocked the protesters from moving to a main thoroughfare.
One policeman was lightly wounded, local police spokesman Fons Bastiaenssens said, adding that a total of 230 people had been detained.
A leader of the Islamist group Sharia4Belgium was among those detained, according to television station RTBF.
Neighbouring Germany yesterday barred notorious US pastor Terry Jones from entering the country after protests over the film that he backs.
A visit by Jones would be contrary to the “interest in maintaining public order”, an interior ministry spokesman said yesterday, referring to plans by a far-right group to invite the Florida pastor to Germany.
Jones, who sparked deadly protests in the past with plans for a public burning of the Holy Qur’an, has said the provocative low-budget movie was not intended to insult Muslims.
The small Pro Deutschland group reportedly wants to stage a Berlin screening of the film that ignited a wave of protests and sometimes deadly violence in the Muslim world last week. “For us, it’s a question of art and freedom of expression,” the group’s leader Manfred Rouhs told the latest edition of news magazine Der Spiegel.
German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich also told Der Spiegel he would use every legal means at his disposal to stop the group showing the film.
“Such groups and organisations only want to provoke Germany’s Muslims,” he said, accusing them of recklessly pouring oil on the fire.
Pro Deutschland is known for its provocative demonstrations. Last month, its activists called protests outside three Berlin mosques, in action they said was aimed at Islamist extremists.