Hundreds of women wearing all-covering burqas protested in front of parliament on Wednesday against Britain's award of a knighthood to novelist Salman Rushdie.
Around 300 female activists from Islamic parties waved flags and banners, an AFP reporter said. One placard read: "Tony Blair, withdraw knighthood title from enemy of Islam Salman Rushdie." The demonstrators blocked the road in front of the parliament building in the heart of Islamabad and listened to speeches delivered through loudhailers.
"He is not a famous writer, why has he been given such a rare title? This is really a move against Muslims," said Samia Raheel Qazi, an MP and head of the women's wing of Jamaat-e-Islami.
In Karachi some 300 Jamaat supporters again torched an effigy of Rushdie, whose book "The Satanic Verses" earned him a death sentence from Iran's clerical leadership in 1989. They chanted "Death to Rushdie" and "Down with the Queen, down with Britain" and demanded that Pakistan sever diplomatic ties with London.
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