Meditating Portuguese actor mistaken for terrorist on Paris plane

He was released after 6 hours of questioning; police watched videos of him online and checked his Wikipedia profile

PARIS: Earlier this week, a Portuguese actor humming a prayer as he meditated to a sacred Tibetan text onboard a plane awaiting takeoff was taken off the flight by police after passengers mistook him for a terrorist.

"Police told me that I had been denounced as a terrorism suspect aboard the plane because I was reciting the Koran aloud, that I was reading a text involving words 'death' and 'bomb'," the man, Heitor Lourenco, said in remarks aired by SIC television on July 2.

The incident occurred on June 30.

Read: United apologises to Muslim woman for soda incident, bans accused crew member

Lourenco, 47, said his text, which he was reading on a tablet device, contained Tibetan characters and the device had the timer on to tell him how long he had meditated, which probably caused associations with a bomb.

Read: Muslim woman subjected to discrimination on United Airline flight considering legal action

He was released after six hours of questioning during which police watched videos of him on the Internet showing that he is a theater and television actor, and checked his profile on Wikipedia, which states that he is a Buddhist.