KABUL — Afghan president Hamid Karzai’s appeal for calm failed to quell nationwide protests over the burning of copies of the Koran earlier this week at a US military base, as anti-American demonstrations spread to new cities Thursday and for the first time led to American casualties.
Hours after the Taliban issued a public appeal Thursday for Afghans to attack foreign-military bases in retaliation over the Koran burning, an Afghan soldier opened fire at a US base in eastern Afghanistan, killing two coalition soldiers, according to Afghan and US officials.
The attack, which Afghan officials said occurred during a protest outside a US base in the Khogyani district of Nangarhar Province, represented the most serious escalation in violence against US-led military forces in three days of unrest.
PHOTOS: AFGHANS PROTEST BURNING OF KORAN
The demonstrations across Afghanistan erupted after coalition soldiers brought a truckload of the Korans and other Islamic books to an incinerator at Bagram Air Field on Monday night. The US military and the White House quickly apologized for the incident, saying it was not intentional.
President Obama sought to tamp down the furor by sending a personal letter of apology to Karzai on Thursday, according to the Afghan president’s office.
In the letter, Obama assured Karzai he “will take the appropriate steps to avoid any recurrence, to include holding accountable those responsible,” the statement from the Afghan presidency said.
In addition to the American casualties, at least 10 Afghans were killed in the street violence that could get considerably worse Friday, when Islamic leaders are expected to use the weekly sermon to denounce the Koran burning at mosques across the country.
Karzai held an emergency meeting with outraged Afghan lawmakers Thursday as Western embassies in Afghanistan remained on high alert. Some of these lawmakers called for a “jihad,” or holy war, against the US on Wednesday. Karzai — who initially condemned the “desecration” of Islam’s holiest book by American troops — issued a belated public appeal for calm late Wednesday.
The US Embassy, which already imposed strict travel restrictions on American personnel in Kabul and other parts of the country, extended the measures to northern Afghanistan on Thursday, where protesters against a Koran burning in Florida stormed a United Nations office last year, killing seven foreigners.
The Taliban sought to capitalize on the widespread outrage by calling Thursday for Afghans across the country to attack Western bases, target military convoys and kill soldiers. At the same time, the Taliban statement affirmed the insurgent group’s support for ongoing negotiations with the US to open a Taliban political office in Qatar.
US military officials have launched an investigation to try to determine why the soldiers were directed to destroy Islamic books from the Bagram detention center’s library. These books, according to some US officials, contained “extremist literature” and prisoners’ “clandestine communications.”
Afghan workers at the incinerator said they stopped the soldiers from incinerating the books, but not before several copies of the Koran had been partially burned.
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