PARIS (AFP/Reuters) - French police enforcing a ban on protests over an anti-Islam film and cartoons desecrating the holy Prophet made 21 arrests in Paris on Saturday and thwarted plans for a march in a northern city.Those arrested, who included several veiled women, were detained near the Place de la Concorde, where a week ago an unauthorised demo against the film led to 150 arrests, and near the Trocadero square by the Eiffel Tower.Riot police were deployed at the city’s Grand Mosque and other areas to enforce the ban on protests over the US-produced film and the cartoons published in a French satirical magazine.Two metro stations serving the Concorde area at the bottom of the Champs Elysees avenue were closed for security reasons, police said, adding that many of those arrested were detained for refusing to present ID papers.AFP reporters in the northern city of Lille saw police stopping a group of about a dozen women trying to unfurl a banner and detaining a man who appeared to be giving orders to the women.The would-be protestors said they wanted to demonstrate against “provocations against Islam”. In Marseille in the south, a police helicopter and 60 riot police deployed to prevent any protests, but only a single demonstrator turned out. Around 30 journalists were also on hand to witness the man’s attempt to defy the ban. Social networks have been awash this week with appeals for Muslims in France, home to western Europe’s largest Islamic community, to hold fresh protests. France’s Muslim leaders however urged their community to respect the law.Paris Grand Mosque head Dalil Boubakeur said Saturday that the absence of any serious trouble on Saturday showed that “the response of the Muslim community in France has been one of contemptuous silence in the face of those who sought to provoke.” Interior Minister Manuel Valls banned any protests this weekend saying they would inevitably threaten public order.Tens of thousands of people on Saturday protested in Nigeria’s second city of Kano, burning images of Barack Obama and stomping on the American flag to denounce the anti-Islam film.A crowd that included men, children and veiled women stretched for several km through the city, the largest in Nigeria’s mainly Muslim north, condemning the film that has stirred outrage across the Muslim world. They shouted “death to America, death to Israel and death to the enemies of Islam,” in a rally that ended with no reported incidents of violence but caused gridlock in the city of roughly 4.5 million people.The Bangladesh authorities on Saturday said they fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of Islamist protesters who defied a ban on demonstrations against the US-made anti-Islam film and hurled stones at police.The clash erupted after the protesters from an alliance of 12 Islamist parties tried to hold a rally in central Dhaka despite a 24-hour ban on gatherings in the area, police said.Hundreds of protesters attacked policemen, torched a motorbike and damaged a police van, forcing police “to fire tear gas shells to disperse them”, Dhaka police spokesman Masudur Rahman told AFP.Whereas, peaceful demonstrations were seen in Brazil and Germany where Christian and Jewish supporters marched alongside Muslims. Some 500 people gathered near the Sau Palo’s Shia mosque - holding posters and chanting in Arabic. Organizers say people from all religions are against the film. Around 1,500 people staged a peaceful protest in the western German city of Dortmund against the film that has enraged Muslims around the world, police said.

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