Pakistan police and rangers taken hostage in anti-France protests

LAHORE, Pakistan — At least seven Pakistan police officers and special rangers were taken hostage on Sunday by supporters of a radical Islamist party, officials said, after days of violent anti-France protests.

Rioting has rocked the country since Monday, when the leader of the now-banned Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) was detained in the second biggest city Lahore after calling for the expulsion of the French ambassador.

The protests have paralysed cities and led to the deaths of six policemen, prompting the French embassy to recommend all its nationals temporarily leave the country.

"The TLP members are holding five police officers and two rangers hostage", said Rana Arif, a police spokesman in Lahore told AFP, referring to the country's paramilitary force.

Firdous Ashiq Awan, a spokeswoman for the Punjab provincial government, said 12 policemen had been abducted and taken to a TLP mosque in Lahore, where hundreds of supporters were gathered.

"Violent groups armed with petrol bombs and acid bottles stormed the Nawankot police station this morning," she tweeted, adding that six police officers have now died in clashes this week.

TLP leaders say several of the party's supporters were killed in Sunday's clashes.

"We won't bury them until the French ambassador is kicked out," Allama Muhammad Shafiq Amini, a TLP leader in the city, said in a video statement.

The police would not comment on the reported TLP deaths.

An oil truck was seized and petrol bombs thrown at officers, both Arif and Awan said.

An AFP reporter at the scene said police used tear gas against stone-throwing protesters.

The TLP has been behind an anti-France campaign for months since President Emmanuel Macron defended the right of Charlie Hebdo magazine to republish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad — an act deemed blasphemous by many Muslims.

Pakistan's Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said party supporters had blocked 191 sites over the past week, with the mosque in Lahore now a gathering point.

“No negotiations are taking place, tried for two-three months but they are not ready to backtrack from their agenda and the government has no other choice but to establish its writ,” he said at a press conference.

Khan’s government has struggled to bring TLP to heel over the years, but this week announced an outright ban against the group — effectively labelling it a terrorist outfit.

Still, on Saturday he suggested the party hadn’t been banned for its ideology, but rather its methods.

“Let me make clear to people here & abroad: Our gov’t only took action against TLP under our anti-terrorist law when they challenged the writ of the state and used street violence & attacking the public & law enforcers,” he tweeted.

Khan said insulting the prophet hurt Muslims around the world.

“We cannot tolerate any such disrespect & abuse,” he added.

He also said Western governments should treat people who insult the Prophet Mohammed the same as those who deny the Holocaust.

“I... call on Western gov’ts who have outlawed any negative comment on the Holocaust to use the same standards to penalise those deliberately spreading their message of hate against Muslims by abusing our Prophet,” Khan tweeted.

Pakistan on Friday blocked social media and instant messaging platforms for several hours to head off major protests.

Blasphemy is a hugely sensitive issue in conservative Pakistan, where laws allow for the death penalty to be used on anyone deemed to have insulted Islam or Islamic figures.

The French embassy’s call for its nationals to leave Pakistan appears to have gone largely unheeded so far.