Pope Benedict XVI has invited representatives of Muslim countries to meet next week at his summer residence, the Vatican said yesterday.
The pope will give an audience to ambassadors to the Holy See of predominantly Muslim countries at Castel Gandolfo on Monday, the Vatican said.
Also expected to take part in the audience is a Muslim council that advised the Italian government on integration issues, the ANSA news agency said.
The Vatican has been seeking to defuse anger across the Muslim world that followed the pope's remarks about Islam in Germany last week.
Muslim scholars and religious leaders at a convention in Pakistan on Thursday demanded the removal of the pope, saying his apology for comments linking Islam to violence was not acceptable.
"The pope has committed blasphemy against our Great Prophet, he should be removed," a resolution adopted by the gathering said.
"The apology and explanation given by the pope is rejected," it said.
The convention, held at a mosque in the eastern city of Lahore, was attended by about 100 Muslim scholars, leaders of some two dozen religious parties and more than 500 party members and supporters, witnesses said.
It was convened to discuss the pope, who earlier this month triggered controversy among Muslims across the globe after he quoted a 14th-century Byzantine emperor who said innovations introduced by the Prophet Mohammed were "evil and inhuman."
The pontiff later said he was "deeply sorry" for the outrage triggered by his speech at a German university and stressed that the passages he quoted did not express his personal opinion.
"The pope's statement against Prophet Mohammed was not unintentional" Sajid Mir, a religious scholar and an MP, told reporters after the convention.
"He has opened a new and an organized front against Islam and Muslims should prepare themselves for jihad because the pope's insulting remarks against Islam follow [US] President George W Bush's statement on crusades," he said.
"We will not allow anybody to degrade our prophet," he added.
The convention called on people across Pakistan to stage protest demonstrations against the pope on Friday.
On Monday Muslims in Pakistani Kashmir burnt an effigy of the pope, while protest rallies were earlier held in major Pakistani cities.
EUROPEAN TARGETS: The planned Munich center would support TSMC’s European customers to design high-performance, energy-efficient chips, an executive said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said that it plans to launch a new research-and-development (R&D) center in Munich, Germany, next quarter to assist customers with chip design. TSMC Europe president Paul de Bot made the announcement during a technology symposium in Amsterdam on Tuesday, the chipmaker said. The new Munich center would be the firm’s first chip designing center in Europe, it said. The chipmaker has set up a major R&D center at its base of operations in Hsinchu and plans to create a new one in the US to provide services for major US customers,
The Ministry of Transportation and Communications yesterday said that it would redesign the written portion of the driver’s license exam to make it more rigorous. “We hope that the exam can assess drivers’ understanding of traffic rules, particularly those who take the driver’s license test for the first time. In the past, drivers only needed to cram a book of test questions to pass the written exam,” Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) told a news conference at the Taoyuan Motor Vehicle Office. “In the future, they would not be able to pass the test unless they study traffic regulations
‘A SURVIVAL QUESTION’: US officials have been urging the opposition KMT and TPP not to block defense spending, especially the special defense budget, an official said The US plans to ramp up weapons sales to Taiwan to a level exceeding US President Donald Trump’s first term as part of an effort to deter China as it intensifies military pressure on the nation, two US officials said on condition of anonymity. If US arms sales do accelerate, it could ease worries about the extent of Trump’s commitment to Taiwan. It would also add new friction to the tense US-China relationship. The officials said they expect US approvals for weapons sales to Taiwan over the next four years to surpass those in Trump’s first term, with one of them saying
‘COMING MENACINGLY’: The CDC advised wearing a mask when visiting hospitals or long-term care centers, on public transportation and in crowded indoor venues Hospital visits for COVID-19 last week increased by 113 percent to 41,402, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, as it encouraged people to wear a mask in three public settings to prevent infection. CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Deputy Director Lee Chia-lin (李佳琳) said weekly hospital visits for COVID-19 have been increasing for seven consecutive weeks, and 102 severe COVID-19 cases and 19 deaths were confirmed last week, both the highest weekly numbers this year. CDC physician Lee Tsung-han (李宗翰) said the youngest person hospitalized due to the disease this year was reported last week, a one-month-old baby, who does not
RSS