2 Afghans Die in Protest Over Koran Burning

KABUL, Afghanistan — Two Afghans died in a remote area of eastern Afghanistan on Sunday when the police fired into a crowd protesting the planned burning of the Koran in Florida, a day after the burning had been called off.
The deaths brought to three the number of Afghans killed in demonstrations tied to the threat made by Terry Jones, a Florida pastor, to burn the Koran on the anniversary of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11.

Mr. Jones relented under intense pressure from the Obama administration and others, but not before tapping a deep well of anger among Afghans. It was likely that many of those protesting on Sunday in Baraki-e-Barak, a district in western Logar Province, had not heard the news. Mass media are scant in the region.

As of Sunday night there had been no reports on local television about a couple of Koran burnings that did take place on Sunday in Tennessee.

The Afghan crowd chanted anti-American slogans, including “death to Americans,” “death to Obama,” and “death to Jews.”

But its violence was directed at the Afghan government, which is seen as beholden to the United States. “A group of protesters engaged with police at around noon and started to throw rocks and bricks at police, wounding some policemen," said Din Mohammad Darwish, spokesman for the governor of Logar Province.

The previous day, the demonstrators burned a police checkpoint, he said. On Sunday, the police fired to stop the crowd from advancing on the district center and burning it, Mr. Darwish said. The shots wounded six people, two of them critically, and they died while being taken for medical treatment.

The planned Koran burning touched a raw nerve in a region deeply proud of its Muslim faith.

“Afghans fought for 30 years against Communism and during mujahedeen time and Afghans are ready to die for their religion and customs and traditions,” said Maulavi Qalamuddin, a former Taliban member from Baraki-e-Barak, who spent nearly seven years in detention at Bagram Airbase. “Whenever someone does something against their values and religion they are quick to anger.”

He said that the protest reflected a broadly popular frustration with the government because the demonstrators included “shopkeepers, teachers and taxi drivers who have to deal with the government every day,” and not people from remote areas of the district.

Muhammad Alam, a high school teacher in the provincial capital, agreed that there was serious disillusionment with the government, although he suspected that the Taliban had also stoked emotions on Sunday.

“In Logar, there is a mixture of Taliban motivating people to do this demonstration and people not being happy with the current administration,” he said. “This regime is based on bribery. You cannot do anything unless you pay a bribe to the government. People are jobless. People are fed up with the current government.”

When the Americans or other foreigners pay for projects, the money is whittled away by corrupt officials, he said. “Needy people cannot get anything at all, so that is why people are resorting to demonstrations to show their anger in any way possible.”

Also on Sunday, NATO officials conceded that civilians may have been killed in a Sept. 2 strike aimed at a man believed to be the Taliban deputy shadow governor of Takhar Province in northern Afghanistan. A NATO statement said that an investigation confirmed that the man, who was associated with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, had been killed, but could not rule out the possibility that civilians were also killed.

President Hamid Karzai, citing reports from local officials, said at the time that the airstrikes killed at least 10 civilians and wounded 3, including a parliamentary candidate who was in the convoy with several campaign workers. The candidate, Abdul Wahid Khurasani, said that the convoy of six vehicles struck by two NATO rockets was part of his campaign team and that the vehicles were draped with campaign posters.

NATO officials disputed that description on Sunday. The NATO statement said there were no campaign signs on the vehicles. They said only one vehicle was struck.

“We are very confident that the targeted individual was in the vehicle struck by the air weapons team and was killed,” said Brig. Gen. Luigi Scollo of the Italian Army, the Joint Command operations chief for the NATO forces. “The question remains why an election official or candidate was traveling with a known terrorist.”