Cartoon protesters storm diplomatic enclave in Pakistan

More than 1,000 protesters stormed into a diplomatic enclave in Islamabad today, and thousands set fire to a provincial assembly building in another city during Pakistan’s most violent wave of protests against the cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed.

Police fired into the air as they tried to disperse a rampaging crowd in the eastern city of Lahore. The protesters smashed windows and torched the sprawling provincial assembly building, witnesses said.

Some of the stone-throwing protesters targeted Western businesses in Lahore, breaking windows at a Holiday Inn hotel and Pizza Hut, KFC and McDonald’s restaurants. They also damaged more than 200 cars, two banks, dozens of shops and a large portrait of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.

The protesters also looted the office of Telenor, a Norwegian mobile phone company, and people ran away with computers, mobile phones and other equipment, witnesses said.

Clouds of tear gas were hanging over central Lahore where the violence occurred.