Protestors disrupt Sudan blasphemy trial

KHARTOUM, May 10 (AFP) — Hundreds of Muslim protestors baying for the death penalty forced a Sudanese court Tuesday to adjourn the trial of a newspaper editor accused of insulting the Prophet Mohammed.

A banner carried by the outraged crowd as they chanted “death to the apostate” during a demonstration against a Sudanese newspaper editor over an article allegedly questioning the parentage of the Prophet Mohamed. (Sudanile).

Heeding calls from Muslim preachers the previous day, some 2,000 people gathered outside the Khartoum courtroom, chanting: “Death to the apostate.”

Defendant Mohammed Ahmed, editor of the Alwifaq daily, had published an article implying that the prophet was not the son of Abdullah and was not born into the Hashemite clan in Mecca.

He was whisked from the courtroom under tight security and taken to Kober Prison instead of the police cell where he had been held for the previous two days, police said.

Ahmed was arrested Sunday on a warrant from the media section of the prosecutors’ office following complaints from prominent Muslim clerics that he had slandered the prophet.

His newspaper has been ordered to cease publication until the trial is over.