COPENHAGEN,
April 6, 2006 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Scandinavian
food group Arla, Europe's second largest dairy firm, confirmed on
Thursday, April 6, that its products were back on shelves in Muslim
countries after weeks of boycott following the publication of the
Danish cartoons mocking Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessing be upon
him).
"Butter
and cheese from Arla Foods are back in 3,000 shops and supermarkets in
the Middle East," the company said in a statement cited by Agence
France-Presse (AFP).
The
dairy giant said it has secured a promise from thirty one of its
largest retail customers in Saudi Arabia to end boycott of its
products as of Saturday, April 8.
"We're
delighted that our largest Saudi customers have decided to lift the
boycott," Arla spokesman Finn Hansen said.
Arla
has been the hardest-hit by a global Muslim boycott of Danish products
after Denmark's mass-circulation daily Jyllands-Posten
commissioned and printed in September twelve caricatures lampooning
Prophet Muhammad.
Prior
to the boycott, Arla products were sold at 50,000 outlets throughout
the Middle East.
It
registered sales in the Middle East last year of 3.2 billion kroner
(402 million euros, 495 million dollars), a third of which were in
Saudi Arabia.
Arla,
which does between six and eight percent of its business in Arab
countries, said the boycott was costing it about 1.6 million dollars a
day.
The
boycott end comes following a call from Muslim scholars after the
company published on Sunday, March 19, full-page ads in papers across
the Middle East denouncing the cartoons publication.
Media
Blitz
The
dairy giant is launching a special media campaign in Saudi Arabia.
"We
are also starting from Saturday a campaign on Saudi televisions and
our salesmen are driving around explaining to shops and consumers our
position," Arla's regional director, Jan Pederson, told Reuters.
The
Scandinavian firm denied, however, reports it was planning to sponsor
an international conference to promote understanding between
religions.
A
full-page ad in the London-based Arabic-language Asharq Al-Awsat
said Arla has decided to sponsor an international conference on
Prophet Muhammad with a view to (promoting) better understanding
between the world's religions and cultures.
"Arla
Foods is not sponsoring such a conference and we haven't published
advertisements of this type," spokesman Louis Honore told the
Danish news agency Ritzau.
He,
however, said the company was interested in supporting a conference or
seminar series on building bridges between cultures.
