ISLAMABAD: Thousands of Pakistanis took to the streets in nationwide protests on Friday against the desecration of the Holy Qur'an in Sweden last week, many of them calling on the government to sever ties with Sweden and boycott the European country's products in protest.
Muslim countries around the world reacted angrily to an Iraqi immigrant in Sweden who desecrated a copy of the holy Qur'an and burned it outside a mosque in Stockholm on the Muslim holiday of Eid Al-Adha last month.
Major rallies were held in the eastern city of Lahore and Karachi, the commercial hub of the country, throughout the day. In Islamabad, lawyers holding copies of the Qur’an protested outside the Supreme Court, while worshippers held demonstrations outside mosques after Friday prayers.
“Whatever happened in Sweden with our holy book, this book is for the whole mankind, all should respect it,” the president of the All-Pakistan Trade Union, Ajmal Baloch, told Arab News while leading a protest demonstration in Islamabad. A large number of people from all walks of life, including businessmen, attended the rally.
Participants chanted slogans and held placards carrying messages against the Swedish government at the rally. Security was beefed up in the capital ahead of the protest while police blocked the road leading to the Swedish embassy in Islamabad.
“Please don’t play with our emotions,” Baloch warned. “We can bear anything, the sanctity of the holy Qur'an is dear to us.”
“We demand the government should immediately expel the Swedish ambassador and recall its ambassador [to Sweden], and I have appealed to all traders to boycott the sale and purchase of all Swedish products and request customers if they see any Swedish product, throw it out on the road,” he added.
Pakistan's parliament adopted a unanimous resolution condemning the act on Thursday, with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif calling on the Swedish government to clarify why the protest was allowed to take place.
Another businessman in Islamabad, Raja Nadeem Minhas, called on the government to take up the matter at the Organization of Islamic Cooperation's (OIC) platform, urging the Muslim world to sever trade relations with Sweden.
“We think the Pakistani prime minister should take up the matter at the OIC,” Minhas said. “Leaders of the whole Muslim world should unite at the OIC level."
Minhas called for laws to be enacted that prevent such acts from happening in the future.
“The Muslim world should unite, and all such countries should be boycotted," he said. "Sever trade relations with them.”
