|HT|
The Pakistan unit of South Korean tech major, Samsung, has issued an apology after violent protests broke out in Karachi over alleged blasphemous comments played inside a mall in the neighbouring country's largest city. In a statement, Samsung Pakistan said it ‘maintains neutrality on religious sentiments’ adding that it has started internal investigations into the matter. On Friday, a WiFi device installed at the Star City Mall played the alleged blasphemous remarks. Soon, news spread like wildfire, and protesters gathered at the site and staged violent protests. Another version of events said the violence was against a mobile QR code introduced by the company, that, supposedly, insulted Prophet Mohammad. Meanwhile, police arrived at the spot, got the device shut, and seized it. As many as 27 Samsung employees have been detained and an inquiry is underway, officials said. While there is no official word on the identity of attackers, or how many of them, if any, have been arrested, it is being reported that they belonged to the extremist Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) group. Blasphemy is a highly sensitive issue in Pakistan and, under the nation's penal code, a person convicted for blasphemy can be fined and even sentenced to death. In December last year, a Sri Lankan factory manager was lynched by a mob in Sialkot.
(Except for the headline and the pictorial description, this story has not been edited by THE DEN staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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