DHAKA, Sept 22: Scores of people were injured on Saturday in clashes in Bangladesh’s capital between police and hundreds of demonstrators, as protests continued across the world against a hate film produced in the United States.

Police fired tear gas and used batons to disperse the stone-throwing protesters, who were from about a dozen religious groups.

The protesters burned several vehicles, including a police van, witnesses said.    Dozens of protesters were arrested at the demonstration and inside the nearby National Press Club, where participants took refuge, a Dhaka Metropolitan Police official said.

Police and witnesses said scores of people were injured.

The clash erupted when authorities attempted to halt the demonstration, police said. Authorities have banned all protests near the city’s main Baitul Mokarram mosque since Friday, when more than 2,000 people marched and burned an effigy of President Barack Obama.

The protesters announced a nationwide strike on Sunday to protest the police action.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan criticised the recent violent protests, but said western nations need to prevent insults to Islam.    “’No one claims freedom of expression when they restrict racism.

“The same restrictions that are imposed on racism must be displayed against Islamophobia,” Erdogan said. “Islamophobia is as dangerous as racism and is something that must not be tolerated.”

Thousands of people also protested in Nigeria’s largest city, Kano. The crowd marched from a mosque to the palace of the Emir of Kano, the region’s top spiritual leader for Muslims.

About 200 students in Srinagar, the main city in Indian-held Kashmir, chanted “Down with America” and “Long live Islam” in a peaceful protest.

Around 1,500 people staged a peaceful protest in the western German city of Dortmund, police said.

A police spokesman said the demonstrators, including many families with children, marched through the city centre and ended the protest with a rally.

“It was absolutely trouble-free and without problems,” he said.

Ban enforced

French police enforcing a ban on protests over the anti-Islam film and some blasphemous sketches made 21 arrests in Paris and thwarted plans for a march in a northern city.

Those arrested, who included several veiled women, were detained near the Place de la Concorde, where a week ago an unauthorised demo against the film led to 150 arrests, and near the Trocadero square by the Eiffel Tower.

Riot police were deployed at the city’s Grand Mosque and other areas to enforce the ban on protests.

Reporters in the northern city of Lille saw police stopping a group of about a dozen women trying to unfurl a banner and detaining a man who appeared to be giving orders to the women.

The would-be protestors said they wanted to demonstrate against “provocations against Islam”.—Agencies