Borders Bookstores to Ban All Cookbooks Containing Pork Recipes

NEW YORK CITY, New York -- (CNN -- Chef News Network) -- The major American bookstore chain Borders has announced that it will no longer sell cookbooks that contain recipes for pork.

Borders spokeman Bay Connereggs stated to CNN, "We absolutely respect our customers' right to choose what they wish to read and buy and we support the First Amendment. And we absolutely support the rights of cooks everywhere to cook pork, and we support chefs everywhere to write cookbooks with recipes for pork dishes. We've just chosen not to carry those cookbooks in our stores any longer. We are doing out out of cultural sensitivity and respect for Islam -- we do not want to offend any religious Muslims, since they consider pork to be an unclean thing."

This is the second time in recent memory that Borders has banned publications because of concerns over Muslim backlash and violence. The bookstore chain has also refused to sell the magazine Free Inquiry because its latest issue contains the controversial Danish cartoons of Muhammad.

Miss Connereggs declined to answer CNN's question why Borders had not previously banned pork recipes out of concern for religious Jews, who also consider pork to be unclean.

Borders is also facing a lawsuit from the National Pork Board, a group of American pork producers and promoters. They claim that Borders' voluntary ban of pork cookbooks is a biased and specified attack on their particular meat industry and that Borders' act could have negative effects on the pork industry.