Charlie Hebdo, the French satirical weekly Newspaper said that on Monday it was pressing charges after receiving fresh death threats against staffers over a cartoon of the Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan who faces rape allegations.
The Oxford professor and 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.
Charlie Hebdo, known for its provocative statements and headlines posted “Rape,” as the caption on Charlie Hebdo’s cover. “The defence of Tariq Ramadan.”
Charlie Hebdo came to fame following the deliberate and provocative cartoons they published about Islam and are known for using any contentious issue to sell the paper.
The full sized cartoon caricature is provocative in the way that Charlie Hebdo’s addresses any Muslim related issue that it can attack.
Later Monday the Paris prosecutor’s office opened a police enquiry into the death threat claim, as Charlie Hebdo claims hate mail had never really stopped after the January 2015 attack in which 12 people were gunned down at its offices.
Tariq Ramadan, 55, has vociferously denied the accusations as a “campaign of lies launched by my adversaries”. He has taken a leave of absence from his role at Oxford to address these allegations.
The details were included within a new article which has been recently published about the period of time when Tariq Ramadan was teaching in Switzerland during his youth.
It has been alleged that four former students of Tariq Ramadan have come forward with new information regarding the renowned intellectual figure.
Following the first complaint, Ramadan had denied the accusations and said that he will sue for “slanderous allegations”.
In a Facebook post he shared with the public, Ramadan wrote that he is “a victim of a campaign of slander clearly orchestrated by my long-time adversaries”.
He completely denied the allegations made against him and said that he will remain “calm and determined” until the long and bitter struggle is over. Tariq Ramadan’s actions have also been denounced by Stéphane Lathion, a former close associate of his.
