Paris police ban anti-Islam film protest in front of Grand Mosque

Paris police have banned a demonstration planned for Saturday in front of the city’s Grand Mosque to protest against a U.S.-made anti-Islam film, a police source said. An individual had made an official request to police to hold the protest.

France’s interior minister has said he will ban all protests over the film after a violent demonstration last weekend near the U.S. embassy in Paris.

The protest was planned to be against the film "Innocence of Muslims” and not against the anti-Islam cartoons mocking Prophet Mohammed published by the French magazine, Charlie Hebdo, on Wednesday.

The satirical French weekly Charlie Hebdo featured several caricatures of the Prophet showing him naked in what the publishers said was an attempt to poke fun at the furor over the privately-made U.S. film trailer.French embassies, consulates, cultural centers and schools in around 20 Muslim countries will be closed on foreign ministry orders on Friday for fear of violence following Muslim weekly prayers. (continue reading...)