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Afghan anti-US protests spread to Kabul
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-05-12 14:46

Demonstrators against the alleged abuse of the Koran at a US military jail took to the streets of Kabul in a third day of protests across Afghanistan that have left four people dead, witnesses said.

Afghan university students chant anti-U.S. slogans during a protest in Kabul May 12, 2005. Several hundred students in the Afghan capital held a protest on Thursday to denounce the United States over a report that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo Bay had desecrated the Koran. [Reuters]
Afghan university students chant anti-U.S. slogans during a protest in Kabul May 12, 2005. Several hundred students in the Afghan capital held a protest on Thursday to denounce the United States over a report that U.S. interrogators at Guantanamo Bay had desecrated the Koran. [Reuters]
Between 200 and 300 Kabul University students carrying banners saying "We condemn the desecration of Koran by the US soldiers" rallied early Thursday in the centre of the capital, an AFP correspondent saw.

Afghan university students try to touch a copy of the Koran during a protest in Kabul May 12, 2005. [Reuters]
Afghan university students try to touch a copy of the Koran during a protest in Kabul May 12, 2005. [Reuters]
They shouted slogans calling on US President George W. Bush to apologise to Islamic countries and saying that proposals for permanent American bases on Afghan soil could damage the country's independence.

Another similar demonstration started at the Polytechnic Institute, northeast of Kabul, where protesters torched a US flag.

Police were at the scene but there were no Afghan or US-led coalition troops present, witnesses said.

Afghan university students march in the streets in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, carrying copies of the Qur'an and sticks and tree branches Wednesday. (AP
Afghan university students march in the streets in Jalalabad, Afghanistan, carrying copies of the Qur'an and sticks and tree branches Wednesday. [AP]
The protests followed two days of rioting in the eastern city of Jalalabad, where four people were killed when police opened fire to control a crowd of thousands of people Wednesday.

Peaceful demonstrations were also held in the southeastern Afghan provinces of Khost, Laghman and Wardak Wednesday.

Newsweek magazine last week cited sources as saying that investigators at the US detention centre in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, uncovered a previously unreported case that interrogators, trying to rattle prisoners, flushed a Koran down a toilet and led a detainee around with a collar and a dog leash.



 
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