LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) -- Muslims burned down a newspaper office Wednesday to protest an article suggesting Islam's prophet might have chosen a wife from among contestants in the Miss World beauty pageant being hosted by Nigeria.

The local office of ThisDay in the northern city of Kaduna was destroyed, police and newspaper officials said. No one was in the building, editor Eniola Bello told The Associated Press. [...]

The Nigerian Muslim Umma, a group of Islamic scholars, declared a "serious religious emergency" Wednesday and called on President Olusegun Obasanjo to cancel the pageant and "sanction" the newspaper. Government officials were not immediately available to comment.

"As a result of the indescribable pain caused to Muslims ... one cannot predict what can happen" if the pageant goes ahead, the group said in a statement. Muslim groups say the pageant promotes sexual promiscuity and indecency.

The article, published Saturday under the headline "The World at Their Feet," questioned the reasoning of Muslim groups that have condemned the pageant. It is being held Dec. 8 in the capital, Abuja.

"The Muslims thought it was immoral to bring 92 women to Nigeria and ask them to revel in vanity. What would (the prophet) Muhammad think? In all honesty, he would probably have chosen a wife from among them," the article's author, Isioma Daniel, wrote. [...]

"We Muslims do not provoke other people. But when we are provoked we do not rest until we deal with the offending agent," Datti Ahmad, president of Shariah in Nigeria, a group supporting the adoption of Islamic law, was quoted as saying by Abuja's Daily Trust newspaper.

Ahmad added: "Nobody will denigrate the holy Prophet of Islam and live in peace with Muslims." [...]