Charlie Hebdo gets fresh death threats over Islam cartoon

French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo says it is pressing charges after receiving fresh death threats over a cartoon of the Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan who faces rape allegations.

The provocative magazine, which suffered a deadly jihadist attack in 2015 after publishing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, depicted Ramadan with a huge erection in its edition last Wednesday, saying: “I am the sixth pillar of Islam.”

The Swiss academic, an Oxford professor and conservative Islamic intellectual in France, has been accused of rape by two women after the Harvey Weinstein scandal unleashed a wave of sexual abuse accusations worldwide. Ramadan has furiously denied the accusations as a “campaign of lies launched by my adversaries.”

Laurent “Riss” Sourisseau, the magazine’s editor, says the threats and hate mail had “never really stopped” after the January 2015 jihadist attack in which 12 people were gunned down at its offices.

“Sometimes there are peaks when we receive explicit death threats on social media — this has been the case once again,” he tells Europe 1 radio. “It’s always difficult to know if these are serious threats or not, but as a principle, we take them seriously and press charges.”

— AFP