KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, (Reuters) – At least five people have been killed in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, on a second day of violent protests over the burning of a Koran by an obscure U.S. pastor, a health official and government spokesman said today.
A suicide attack also hit a NATO military base in the capital Kabul, the day after protesters over-ran a UN mission in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif and killed seven foreign staff, in the worst ever attack on the UN in Afghanistan.
Four dead bodies brought to a hospital in Kandahar city, the spiritual heartland of the Taliban, showed signs they had been beaten and hit with stones said Abdul Qayum Pukhla, the senior health official for the province.
A band of around 150 men who had taken to the streets to denounce Koran burning set tyres alight, smashed up shops and attacked a photographer, Reuters’ witnesses said.
The reporter was hit over the head and had his camera taken from him and smashed, by protesters who discussed killing him. Police kept other journalists from approaching the crowd, which was shouting slogans including “death to America”.
The spokesman for the governor of Kandahar province said the protest was organised by the Taliban who used the Koran burning as an excuse to incite violence in a city where their reach has been curtailed by an aggressive NATO-led military campaign.
“The demonstration in Kandahar was planned by insurgents to take advantage of the situation and to create insecurity,” said Zalmay Ayoubi, spokesman for the Kandahar provincial governor. He put the toll at five and said 46 people had been wounded.
In Kabul today, a small group of burkha-clad insurgents attacked a coalition base, although they caused only light injuries to three soldiers, police and NATO-led troops said.
More protests are possible across volatile and deeply religious Afghanistan, where anti-Western sentiment has been fuelled for years by civilian casualties.
Around 1,000 people protested peacefully in the northern province of Tahar, said Shah Jahan Noori, provincial police chief.
