The editor of Charlie Hebdo has announced that the French magazine will no longer draw cartoons of the founder of Islam, Mohammed.
Laurent Sourisseau, who uses the nom de plume ‘Riss’ when he draws cartoons, told the German magazine Stern “We've done our job. We have defended the right to caricature.”
In January two Islamist terrorists affiliated with Al-Qaeda in Yemen shot up the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris, killing 12 of it’s journalists, including top France’s leading cartoonists. Their attack was stated to be in revenge for Charlie Hebdo’s drawing of Mohammed.
Sourisseau was there that day, and survived only by playing dead. He became editor on the death of Stephanne ‘Charb’ Charbonnier.
He told the interviewer “We have drawn Muhammad to defend the principle that one can draw whatever they want.”
He also called out other outlets who lauded Charlie Hebdo but did not draw cartoons themselves, saying “It is a bit strange though: we are expected to exercise a freedom of expression that no one dares to.”
Renald Luzier, the cartoonist who drew the first cover Charlie Hebdo put out after the massacre, which sold in record numbers around the world, quit in May, citing fatigue. He said that it was ‘torture’ to produce the magazine without his slain friends and coworkers.
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