Virendra Pandit
New Delhi: Paris has advised the French citizens to leave Pakistan for their own safety after threats to their life and property by a far-right Islamist outfit, Tehrik-e-Labaik Pakistan (TLP), which was banned by Islamabad on Wednesday after large-scale violence and hostage-taking of policemen.
Early this week, thousands of TLP Islamists, protesting against the arrest of their Emir (leader), Saad Hussain Rizvi, had clashed with the police and security forces ahead of rallies denouncing content published by a French magazine that caricatured the Prophet, Mohammad.
Amid reports that the outfit was threatening French citizens in Pakistan, Paris has advised them to temporarily leave the South Asian country and warned of serious threats to French interests in the country.
For Muslims, depictions of the Prophet are blasphemous. Media reports quoting diplomatic sources said that a message had been sent overnight to French citizens and companies following threats by TLP to target French interests.
The embassy sent a message to French residents in Pakistan recommending that they leave the country and shut down activities at French companies temporarily “due to the serious threats to French interests in Pakistan”.
Relations between Paris and Islamabad worsened after President Emmanuel Macron paid tribute to a French history teacher who was beheaded by an 18-year-old Muslim man of Chechen origin for showing cartoons of the Prophet in a class on freedom of speech in 2020.
The images sparked anger and protests in the Muslim world, especially in Pakistan, and even saw a Pakistani minister forced to withdraw comments she made that Macron was treating Muslims like Nazis had treated Jews in the Second World War.
Pakistan had also summoned the French Ambassador in Islamabad to register its protest.
Last year, TLP ended a similar protest against France only after the government signed a ‘deal’ agreeing to endorse a boycott of French products and making a move in parliament to expel the French ambassador. Again, the outfit had this week demanded the envoy be expelled. The government responded by arresting its leader and banning the outfit.