Death toll mounts in worldwide protests against anti-Muslim cartoons

It is noteworthy that those who have rallied to the defense of the right-wing anti-immigrant newspaper in Denmark that first published the racist cartoons have had little to say about the violence of repressive governments across the Middle East against their own people registering outrage over the widely disseminated insult to their religion.

These ostensible defenders of press freedom instinctively sympathize with the regime of Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan, which “defended freedom” by shooting down seven demonstrators. Other deaths were reported in Lebanon, Turkey and Somalia. All but one of those killed were Muslim protesters.

In Afghanistan, two people were killed Sunday in separate protests in Kabul and the central town of Mihtarlam. The demonstrators in the capital linked the anti-Muslim cartoons to the US military occupation of their country and clashed with NATO troops. The protesters chanted: “Death to Denmark! Death to Norway! Death to America! Death to Bush!”

On Monday two more demonstrators were shot to death in front of the main US base at Bagram, just outside Kabul, and three more were killed Tuesday by Afghan and Norwegian troops at a NATO base in Maymana, on the country’s northern border.

Thousands took part in demonstrations from the Indian subcontinent to North Africa: in New Delhi, India; Peshawar, Pakistan; Tehran, Iran; Amman, Jordan; Cairo, Egypt. In the Iranian capital, hundreds of police were mobilized at the Danish embassy and opened fire with tear gas, but a group of 400 youth broke through the cordon and set fire to the building.

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