Rihanna kicked out of Mosque over photo shoot

Rihanna performs in Sydney, Australia.

Don Arnold/WireImage

By Kory Grow

 

After Rihanna posed for photos at Abu Dhabi's Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque this weekend, its staff asked the singer to leave, according to The Associated Press. Overseers at the mosque later explained that Rihanna had been in an area that was typically off-limits to visitors and that her fashion-style shoot didn't support the "status and sanctity of the mosque." Images of the photo shoot, which Rihanna posted to her Instagram account, depict the pop star in a black outfit with her hair covered striking poses and lying down around the grounds of the mosque. Rihanna, who performed in the city on Saturday, has yet to respond publicly to the overseers' statements.

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It's not the first time Rihanna or her Instagram account have raised international eyebrows on her lengthy Diamonds World Tour. When the singer stopped through Thailand for a respite between concerts in late September, she posted a picture of herself with a slow loris, an endangered, squirrel-like species of primate with big eyes. Her photo led to the arrest of the animal's keepers, a 20-year-old man and a 16-year-old boy, for possession of a protected animal, according to The Huffington Post. They face up to four years in prison and the equivalent of a $1,300 fine.
Her Thailand trip also prompted the arrest of a bar owner two weeks after Rihanna tweeted about a sex show on the island of Phuket that took place at a bar that apparently had no permit. "Authorities found out about this bar the morning after Rihanna tweeted about it, but we were not able to catch them violating the law until Saturday night," district police chief Weera Kerdsirimongkon said. "We had been waiting for them and finally caught them red-handed." The bar owner faces an approximately $1,900 fine and up to a month in prison for obscenity and operating a venue without permission

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