(19 Jan 2015) Thousands of people gathered in the southern Russian region of Chechnya on Monday to rally against French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
Protesters marched through the streets of downtown Grozny, the capital of the predominantly Muslim region, released balloons and carried posters that read "We love Prophet Muhammad".
Chechen leader Ramzan Karyrov told protesters that "Muslim people won't allow (ourselves) to be used for destabilising the situation in the country", referring to Russia.
A police spokesman told Interfax news agency that 800,000 people attended the protest on Monday, although those numbers were impossible to verify.
Russia, which has a large and restive Muslim population and waged two devastating wars against Chechen separatists in the 1990s, offered its condolences to France after the Paris attacks earlier this month.
It has warned Russian publications, however, against reprinting any Charlie Hebdo cartoons that feature the Prophet Mohammed.
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