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Cartoon Crisis: Nigerian MPs Burn Denmark's and Norway's Flags

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Cartoon depicting Anne Frank in bed with Adolph Hitler on Islamic website

A small Arab movement active in Belgium, the Netherlands and Denmark called the Arab European League posted a drawing on its Web site of Hitler in bed with Anne Frank. "Write this one in your diary, Anne," Hitler was shown as saying. The intent of the cartoon, the Arab European League said, was "to use our right to artistic expression" just as the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten did when it published a group of cartoons showing Muhammad last September. "Europe has its sacred cows, even if they're not religious sacred cows," said Dyab Abou Jahjah, the founder of the organization, which claims rights for immigrants aggressively but without violence. Read here for more and HERE

NIGERIA

Nigerian Members of Parliament (MP) cheered in the northern majority Muslim state of Kano as Danish and Norwegian flags were burned in a ceremony in the Parliament premises.

The flags were torched to show disapproval of the publication in Denmark and Norway of cartoons satirising the Prophet Muhammad.

Earlier Kano state MPs passed a resolution to call off multi-million dollar trade negotiations with Denmark.

Some 200 people, including the 40 state parliamentarians, attended the flag burning.

They shouted "Allah Akbar" (God is great) as Kano's parliament speaker Balarabe Saidu Gani set the flags alight.

On Monday, the MPs passed a resolution ordering the Kano state government

to call off negotiations with Denmark over a hydroelectric plant worth some $25m and

to cancel the purchase of 72 buses from the country worth some $57m.

The Christian Association of Nigeira has condemned the publication of the cartoons.

Tensions between Christians and Muslims in Nigeria have led to clashes leaving thousands dead in recent years.

NIGER

In Niger, thousands took part in banned protests against the cartoons. The centre of Niger's capital, Niamey, came to a standstill as tens of thousands of Muslim protesters called on Niger's government to condemn the cartoon.

Permission for the march was withdrawn at the last minute for fear the situation would get out of hand, but the protesters ignored this.

For three hours, religious leaders addressed angry crowds condemning what they called the gratuitous provocation of Muslims by the West.

Anti-riot police protected Denmark's embassy in the capital, but the demonstration came to an end peacefully.

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