France urges Arab states to prevent goods boycotts over Macron's cartoons defence

FE Team | Published: October 26, 2020 20:49:45

French goods at a store in Riyadh — Internet

PARIS, Oct 26 (BBC): France has urged Middle Eastern countries to end calls for a boycott of its goods in protest at President Emmanuel Macron's defence of the right to show cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.
The French foreign ministry said the "baseless" calls for a boycott were being "pushed by a radical minority".
French products have been removed from some shops in Kuwait, Jordan and Qatar.
Meanwhile, protests have been seen in Libya, Syria and the Gaza Strip.
The backlash stems from comments made by Mr Macron after the gruesome murder of a French teacher who showed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in class.
The president said the teacher, Samuel Paty, "was killed because Islamists want our future", but France would "not give up our cartoons".
Depictions of the Prophet Muhammad are widely regarded as taboo in Islam, and are offensive to Muslims.
But state secularism - or laïcité - is central to France's national identity. Curbing freedom of expression to protect the feelings of one particular community, the state says, undermines unity.
On Sunday, Mr Macron doubled down on his defence of French values in a tweet that read: "We will not give in, ever."
Political leaders in Turkey and Pakistan have rounded on Mr Macron, accusing him of not respecting "freedom of belief" and marginalising the millions of Muslims in France.
On Sunday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan suggested, for a second time, that Mr Macron should seek "mental checks" for his views on Islam.
Similar comments prompted France to recall its ambassador to Turkey for consultations on Saturday.
Some supermarket shelves had been stripped of French products in Jordan, Qatar and Kuwait by Sunday. French-made hair and beauty items, for example, were not on display.
In Kuwait, a major retail union has ordered a boycott of French goods.
The non-governmental Union of Consumer Co-operative Societies said it had issued the directive in response to "repeated insults" against the Prophet Muhammad.
In a statement, the French foreign ministry acknowledged the moves, writing: "These calls for boycott are baseless and should stop immediately, as well as all attacks against our country, which are being pushed by a radical minority."
Online, calls for similar boycotts in other Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia, have been circulating.
A hashtag calling for the boycott of French supermarket chain Carrefour was the second-most trending topic in Saudi Arabia, the Arab world's largest economy.
Meanwhile, small anti-French protests were held in Libya, Gaza and northern Syria, where Turkish-backed militias exert control.