Protests over caricatures a ‘growing global crisis’

DENMARK’S Prime Minister yesterday appealed for calm amid what he called a “growing global crisis” over drawings of the prophet Mohammed.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen said: "It now is something else than the drawings in Jyllands-Posten."

The Jyllands-Posten, a Danish paper, first published the drawings that have sparked violent protests in Muslim countries worldwide. They have since been reprinted in media around the world.

Demonstrators in Afghanistan yesterday clashed with NATO forces and three protesters were killed.

"Now it has become an international political matter," he said. "I urge calm and steadiness."

Outraged Muslim demonstrators, who have set fire to the Danish embassies in Syria and Lebanon and have held chaotic protests elsewhere, have demanded the Danish Government apologise for the cartoons, which Jyllands-Posten printed in September.

But Mr Fogh Rasmussen's statements indicated that Denmark is not contemplating changes in its strategy for responding to the spiralling tensions.

Mr Fogh Rasmussen has insisted that Denmark's press freedom culture means the government cannot apologise for what an independent newspaper does.

The newspaper has apologised for any offence caused to Muslims but has defended its printing of the drawings.

The drawings including one depicting the prophet wearing a turban shaped as a bomb have touched a raw nerve in part because Islam is interpreted to forbid any illustrations of the prophet Mohammed for fear they could lead to idolatry.

"We appeal to Muslims around the world to look beyond the headlines and the rhetoric," Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said.

Earlier, the foreign ministry said the Danish embassy in Jakarta, Indonesia, has been temporarily closed because of fears it would be stormed.

Niels Erik Andersen, Denmark's ambassador to Indonesia, said Muslim groups throughout Indonesia had been burning Danish flags and effigies of Mr Fogh Rasmussen.

The United Nations evacuated staff and NATO peacekeepers rushed British reinforcements to a remote Afghan town after fierce fighting targeted Norwegian troops. A magazine in the Scandinavian country was the first to reproduce the Danish images.

The violence in Maymana, a city in the north-west, was just one of about half-a-dozen riots that erupted across Afghanistan.

Protesters armed with assault rifles and grenades attacked the NATO base in Maymana, burning an armoured vehicle, a UN car and guard posts, said a doctor at Maymana Hospital.

Some in the crowd fired weapons and threw stones and hand grenades, and the Norwegian troops responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and warning shots, said Sverre Diesen, commander of Norwegian forces.

Three protesters were shot to death and 25 others were wounded, while some 50 others were hurt by tear gas fired by the peacekeepers, said Sayed Aslam Ziaratia, the provincial deputy police chief.

In neighbouring Pakistan, 5,000 people chanting "Hang the man who insulted the prophet!" burned effigies of a Danish cartoonist.

US President George W Bush called Mr Fogh Rasmussen to express "solidarity and support" in the wake of the violence, the White House said yesterday.

Spokesman Scott McClellan said the leaders agreed that all sides must move forward "through dialogue and tolerance, not violence".

In India's portion of the disputed region of Kashmir, police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters. At least six protesters and two police were injured in the clash, a police said.

An aid group that provides food to tens of thousands of people in war-ravaged Chechnya suspended its operations after Chechen officials banned all Danish organisations.