Pacific

March in Tahiti to protest Moslem prayer room

06:53 am on 11 November 2013

About 400 people in French Polynesia have marched through Papeete in an unprecedented protest against plans to open a Moslem prayer room in Tahiti.

The crowd walked to the territorial assembly, carrying placards opposing radical Islam, sharia law and the wearing of the burqa.

This comes after a French imam last month opened a prayer room which was shut within days after the city administration found that the premises were only to be used as office space.

One of the march organisers has told the Tahiti-Infos news site the demonstrators have no legal basis to stop a mosque from being set up but want to express their opposition.

The imam's project prompted an extraordinary debate in the territorial assembly last month and his lawyer said he has received death threats.