Supporters of a Pakistani religious group shouting slogans during a march towards Islamabad on Wednesday. (Photo: AP)

Thousands of Islamists have launched a march towards Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, to protest a Dutch politician's plans to hold a Prophet Muhammad cartoon contest later this year.

The march began yesterday in Lahore. The protesters are expected to reach Islamabad today. Imran Khan, the new prime minister, has vowed to take the matter to the United Nations, and his government has summoned the Dutch ambassador to lodge a formal protest.

At the same time, it has so far dismissed calls to expel the envoy.

An estimated 10,000 protesters took part in the march, chanting, "We will die to protect the honor of the prophet."

Tehreek-i-Labaik, a hardline Islamist group that helped organise the protests, supported Imran Khan's bid to be prime minister. Last year, this same group disrupted life in Islamabad with a three-week rally against an omitted reference to the Prophet in a constitutional bill. Organizers say this time they will disperse after a daylong protest.

The protesters are expected to reach Islamabad today. (Photo: AP)

Images of Prophet Muhammad are traditionally forbidden in Islam as idolatrous. Caricatures are regarded by most Muslims as highly offensive.

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Blasphemy is punishable by death in Pakistan, where the mere accusation of it can cause lynchings.

FAR-RIGHT DUTCH LEADER PLANS TO HOLD CONTEST IN PARTY OFFICE

The cartoon contest in the Netherlands is being organized by Geert Wilders, a far-right lawmaker with a history of incendiary remarks about Islam.

His Freedom Party has become the Netherlands' second-largest, and pushes anti-Islam and populist themes.

Geert Wilders at a news conference in Prague, in the Czech Republic, in December. (Photo: Reuters)

Wilders plans to hold his contest in his party's office in the parliament building. He says it's his right to do so under the country's freedom of speech laws.

A former Pakistani cricketer, Khalid Latif, has offered a $28,000 reward for anyone who would "kill the Dutchmen" behind the contest.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte has said he doesn't endorse Wilder's contest but that he will defend the parliamentarian's right to hold it.

The Dutch police have arrested a 26-year-old man suspected of threatening to attack Wilders over his plan, a police spokesman said yesterday. The suspect's nationality hasn't been determined.

In 2005, the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published cartoons of Prophet Muhammad that sparked a wave of protest across the Muslim world and several attempts to kill either its editor or cartoonist Kurt Westergaard.

Ten years later, terrorists stormed the offices of magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris, known for publishing satirical cartoons of the Prophet, and killed 12 people.

Inputs from agencies

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