At least six people were killed and 19 injured Wednesday after thousands of Afghanis for the second day staged angry demonstrations in Kabul and Jalalabad over the alleged Quran burning by US military, Xinhua reported.
Protests erupted Tuesday here after media reports said copies of the Quran were found in the garbage that NATO forces transported in a truck Monday night to a pit where waste is burned.
US officials apologised Tuesday over the incident at Bagram airbase, 50 km north of Kabul where hundreds of suspected Taliban and Al-Qaida operatives have been held.
One person was killed in the capital city of Kabul, one in Jalalabad city and two in Parwan province, the BBC reported.
Officials at Bagram reportedly believed Taliban prisoners were using the books to pass messages to one another.
The charred remains of the volumes were found by local labourers.
In Kabul, protesters shouted, “Death to America!” and threw stones at Camp Phoenix, the main US base in the city.
Riot police used water cannon to disperse protesters, some of whom were blocking the road leading to Jalalabad, one of the main trade routes to the capital.
Protesters also burned an effigy of US President Barack Obama in Jalalabad, and set on fire oil tankers.
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CULTURAL SENSITIVITIES
Twenty-one people, including 11 policemen, were wounded in the capital, said Mohammad Zahir, head of Kabul police’s crimes unit. They included the city police chief, Ayoub Salangi, who was hit in the ankle by a stone.
In Parwan province, home to Bagram, four people were shot dead by Afghan police and 10 were wounded while attacking offices, provincial officials and the interior ministry said.
A protester was shot dead by police in Logar province, east of the capital, the governor’s spokesman, Deen Mohammad Darwish, said. Hundreds protested in front of the governor’s office. Some threw stones.
Afghan health ministry spokesman Ghulam Sakhi Kargar said one person also died in hospital in Kabul from gunshot wounds received during one of two shooting incidents at protests in at least four areas of the snow-bound capital.
Critics say Western troops often fail to grasp the country’s religious and cultural sensitivities. Muslims consider the Quran the literal word of God and treat each book with deep reverence.
Demonstrations by as many as 2,000 people broke out as word of the Bagram find spread.
Police said most injuries were caused by flying stones and sticks hurled by protesters. Demonstrators had charged police lines and nearby military bases at a protest on the edge of Kabul, burning tyres and smashing vehicles and building windows.
Protesters shouted “Death to America!” and “Death to (President Hamid) Karzai” as black smoke rose over a large demonstration on the outskirts of the Afghan capital.
“When the Americans insult us to this degree, we will join the insurgents,” said Ajmal, an 18-year-old protester in Kabul.
Demonstrators set fire to part of a housing compound used by foreign contract workers. A Reuters witness said the fire damaged part of a guesthouse at the Green Village complex, where 1,500 mostly foreign contractors live and work.
Outrage also spilled over in the Afghan parliament, where several members shouted “death to America” inside the legislative chamber.
The protests spread to several cities.
In Jalalabad, to the east, some protesters burned US flags and shouted “Death to America”. Others set ablaze fuel tankers near the city’s airport.
Demonstrators praised the leader of the Afghan Taliban, the secretive Mullah Mohammad Omar, screaming “Long live Mullah Omar!”, Reuters witnesses said. Five people were wounded, the governor’s spokesman said.
In neighbouring Pakistan’s largest city Karachi, around 100 Islamic seminary students protested against the Quran burnings.
“Pakistan’s government should summon the American ambassador and demand an apology. And if he doesn’t apologise, he should be kicked out of the country,” said Abdul Basit, a protest leader.
Others took a harder line.
“No forgiveness for the descrators of the Quran,” a section of the crowd shouted. “Only death.”