A NEWPORT newsagent is to stock the latest edition of Charlie Hebdo magazine.

Jon Powell, 36, a kiosk owner on Newport High Street, will stock the magazine on Friday after several of his customers requested it.

The new magazine carries a front cover cartoon depicting the Prophet Mohammed crying. The new edition of Charlie Hebdo is in defiance of the gunmen who slaughtered 12 people at its Paris offices over its previous depictions of the Prophet.

Three million copies of the magazine are being printed, its largest-ever run, with translations into English, Spanish and Arabic, and versions available in the UK, Italy and Turkey.

The first batch of around 500,000 copies was quickly snapped up by customers and it has been reported that the print run is being increased to five million to be distributed throughout the next fortnight.

Mr Powell, who has been a newsagent for 18 years, said that the magazine will be sold at face value and on a first come, first serve basis.

He said: “It was in response to customers calling first thing this morning to get a copy.

“I phoned the wholesalers, Smiths News, and put my name down for a couple of copies and if there were a few extra.

“I put it out there on social media and the demand increased to 30 copies. The phone has been ringing red hot.

“I’ll get what I’m giving and, already, some are up on Ebay but I will be selling at face value on a first come, first serve basis.

“I’ll only charge the cover price and I’ll get as many as I can to serve the people of Newport. I’m providing the news that people want and I wouldn’t want to make money on the back of misfortune.”

He added: “It was a big call to make to publicise it, but it was the right thing to do. I have sympathy for the people who make the magazine.

“The reaction is a little bit of a concern, but if it’s perfectly legal to sell them, we’ll sell them. I don’t judge anyone for any other purchase – whether it’s cigarettes or top-shelf magazines.

“It’s my job to provide things that are required within law. Looking at the magazines in the shop, plenty of things offend different people for different reasons. We live in a free society, within reason.”

The first edition of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo sold out across France today a week after the bloody attack on its offices.

Yesterday, Francois Hollande saluted the "courage, the bravery, the dignity" of Franck Brinsolaro, Ahmed Merabet and Clarissa Jean-Philippe, the three police officers killed on January 7 and 8.

The other dead included four hostages killed later in a kosher supermarket, who have been remembered at funerals in Israel.

A total of 17 people were killed in a two-day spree launched by fundamentalist brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi and their friend Amedy Coulibaly.

A handful of copies are expected to be available in the UK by the end of the week, although some have already found their way on to eBay where they are attracting four-figure bids, well in excess of the modest three-euro (£2.30) cover price.