Four killed, 71 hurt in Afghan protests

Four people were killed and at least 71 injured when police opened fire on hundreds of student protestors as they rampaged through an Afghan city.

Protesting over the alleged desecration of Islam’s holy book by US military interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, the students shouted “Death to America”, as demonstrators smashed car and shop windows and stoned a passing convoy of American soldiers in the city of Jalalabad, near the Pakistan border. It was the biggest outpouring of anti-American sentiment since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

The US troops fired into the air before quickly leaving the area, provincial intelligence chief Sardar Shah said.

The Interior Ministry said four people were killed and that the 71 injured included seven police officers. It didn’t identify the victims any further or say how they were hurt.

Deputy provincial health chief Mohammed Ayub Shinwari said most of the injured were students. He reported that two of the dead had been fatally shot and many of the injured had also suffered gunshot wounds.

The US Embassy said it was “deeply concerned” at the violence, and said the American government will investigate the allegations of desecration.

“The US respects the right of all people to practice their own religion, and that disrespect toward the holy book of any religion is unacceptable,” Charge d’Affaires Richard Christenson said in a statement.

Mobs also attacked the Pakistani consulate and the offices of two UN agencies and several relief organisations. No foreigners were reported hurt.

“There is a lot of damage to the city, they have burned a lot of things,” Shah said. “These are the enemies of peace and stability in Afghanistan who don’t want people to be able to get on with their lives in peace.”

US military spokeswoman Lt Cindy Moore said American forces in the area were ordered back to their camps but had no information on whether any of them were caught up in the unrest.

The demonstrations began yesterday, when protesters burned an effigy of US President George Bush over a report in Newsweek magazine that interrogators at the US prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba placed Qurans on toilets in order to rattle suspects, and in at least one case “flushed a holy book down the toilet.”

A television cameraman said the crowds in Jalalabad grew larger and wilder after the police firing, and that the streets were deserted of traffic. Mobs pelted a government office and the local television station with rocks and tore down posters of President Hamid Karzai.

The Swedish Committee for Afghanistan, one of the largest aid organisations in the country, said staff at its Jalalabad office took refuge on the roof as a mob stole, smashed or burned their equipment and torched two of their cars.

Murat Khan, Pakistan’s deputy counsellor, said the consulate building as well as his boss’s home were in flames.

People broke into two UN compounds and burned two cars, a UN spokeswoman said.

Police and government troops had restored order by early afternoon, witnesses said.

University and high school students held similar but peaceful protests in cities in neighbouring Laghman province and Khost, further to the south.

Witnesses said students also demanded the release of all prisoners from Guantanamo, and that “American troops don’t stay in Afghanistan forever” - tricky issues likely to be discussed when Karzai meets Bush in Washington later this month.

The government of neighbouring Pakistan – like Afghanistan, a conservative Muslim nation and close ally in Washington’s war on terrorism – on Saturday said it was “deeply dismayed” over the magazine report, and called for an inquiry.

A coalition of hardline Islamic parties in Pakistan said it will hold nationwide protests on Friday, the traditional day of prayer for Muslims.

The US is holding about 520 people at Guantanamo Bay, many of them al Qaida and Taliban suspects captured in Pakistan and Afghanistan following the September 11, 2001, attacks in America.