Thousands of Afghans protest against U.S. Qur’an abuse
5/10/2005 1:15:00 PM GMT

Thousands of Afghan students took to the streets on Tuesday, chanting “Death to America”, protesting against a report that U.S. interrogators in Guantanamo Bay had desecrated the Qur’an, the Muslims holy book.

Newsweek magazine reported in a recent edition that investigators studying abuses at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba have found that U.S. interrogators “had placed copies of Qur’an on toilets, and in at least one case flushed a holy book down the toilet”.

“American should apologize for this,” said one student at the protest in Jalalabad city, about 130 km (80 miles) east of the Afghan capital, Kabul.

“Whoever has done this should be brought to justice and the Afghan government should condemn it.”

Some protesters were holding an effigy of the American President George W. Bush while shouting “Death to Bush”.

Demonstrators blocked the main road to Kabul, however, no clashes with the Afghan police were reported, witnesses said.

Also Pakistani officials have lately expressed their outrage and demanded an apology from the U.S. and launching an inquiry into the Newsweek report.

http://www.aljazeera.com/me.asp?service_ID=8190