Obama Apologizes for Quran Burning, Karzai: US Officer Responsible

US President Barack Obama voiced on Thursday his deep regrets over burning copies of the holy Quran to the his Afghan counterpart, Hamid Karzai, who said that a US officer was responsible for the act.

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Obama sent  Karzai a letter of apology over the incident.

The US president the burning was “unintentional” and pledged a full investigation, the president's office said, as fierce anti-US protests swept the nation in which at least 14 people have died, including two American soldiers.

"I wish to express my deep regret for the reported incident," Obama wrote in the letter presented to Karzai by US ambassador Ryan Crocker. "I extend to you and the Afghan people my sincere apologies."
"The error was inadvertent; I assure you that we will take the appropriate steps to avoid any recurrence, to include holding accountable those responsible," the letter said.

For his part, Karzai said the burning was done "out of ignorance" and the US government had admitted the mistake, Karzai told members of parliament in a meeting, according to a statement from his office.

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Twelve Martyred in Koran-Burning Protests Across Afghanistan

Iranian cleric Ahmad Khatami said the U.S. had purposely burned the Korans. "These apologies are fake. The world should know that America is against Islam."

(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Twelve people were martyred on Friday in the bloodiest day yet in protests that have raged across Afghanistan over the desecration of copies of the Muslim holy book at a NATO military base with riot police and soldiers on high alert braced for more violence.

The burning of the Korans at the Bagram compound earlier this week has deepened public mistrust of NATO forces struggling to stabilize Afghanistan before foreign combat troops withdraw in 2014.

Hundreds of Afghans marched toward the palace of Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul, while on the other side of the capital protesters hoisted the white flag of the Taliban.

Chanting "Death to America!" and "Long live Islam!," protesters also threw rocks at police in Kabul, while Afghan army helicopters circled above.

Friday is a holy day and the official weekly holiday in Afghanistan and mosques in the capital drew large crowds, with police in pick-up trucks posted on nearby streets.

Armed protesters took refuge in shops in the eastern part of the city, where they killed one demonstrator, said police at the scene. In another Kabul rally, police said they were unsure who fired the shots that killed a second protester.

Seven more protesters were killed in the western province of Herat, two more in eastern Khost province and one in the relatively peaceful northern Baghlan province, health and local officials said. In Herat, around 500 men charged at the U.S. consulate.

U.S. President Barack Obama had sent a letter to Karzai apologizing for the unintentional burning of the Korans at NATO's main Bagram air base, north of Kabul, after Afghan laborers found charred copies while collecting rubbish.

Muslims consider the Koran to be the literal word of God and treat each copy with deep reverence. Desecration is considered one of the worst forms of blasphemy.

Afghanistan wants NATO to put those responsible on public trial.

In neighboring U.S. ally Pakistan, about 400 members of a hardline Islamist group staged protests. "If you burn the Koran, we will burn you," they shouted.

To Afghanistan's west, Iranian cleric Ahmad Khatami said the U.S. had purposely burned the Korans. "These apologies are fake. The world should know that America is against Islam," he said in a speech broadcast live on state radio.

"It (the Koran burning) was not a mistake. It was an intentional move, done on purpose."

Most Westerners have been confined to their heavily fortified compounds, including at the sprawling U.S. embassy complex and other diplomatic missions, as protests that have killed a total of 23 people, including two U.S. soldiers, rolled into their fourth day. The embassy, in a message on the microblogging site Twitter, urged U.S. citizens to "please be safe out there" and expanded movement restrictions to relatively peaceful northern provinces, where large demonstrations also occurred Thursday, including the attempted storming of a Norwegian military base.

The Taliban urged Afghan security forces Thursday to "turn their guns on the foreign infidel invaders" and repeatedly urged Afghans to kill, beat and capture NATO soldiers.

Germany, which has the third-largest foreign presence in the NATO-led war, pulled out several weeks early of a small base in the northern Takhar province Friday over security concerns, a defense ministry spokesman said.

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Wave of Violence Attacks Baghdad, 60 Martyred at Least Mostly Shia

Simultaneous early morning attacks on mostly Shia targets across Iraq martyred at least 60 people and wounded dozens on Thursday in one of the bloodiest days of violence since U.S. troops pulled out in mid-December.

 (Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - The attacks that appeared to pitch al Qaeda-linked insurgents against Shi'ites raised fears of a return to the widespread sectarian carnage that tore Iraq apart and cost thousands of lives in 2006 and 2007.

At least 32 people were killed in blasts in Baghdad where 10 explosions tore through mainly Shi'ite neighbourhoods during rush hour and other attacks targeted police patrols, commuters and crowds gathered in shopping areas.

"We were sitting at a restaurant having soup for breakfast when the bomb exploded. I lost consciousness and then saw smoke and dust when I came to. I saw people and body parts everywhere," police officer Ahmed Kadhim told Reuters.

Kadhim suffered shrapnel wounds to his left leg and back when a car bomb exploded near a restaurant killing six people and wounding 18 in Baghdad's northern Kadhimiya district.

The interior ministry blamed al Qaeda and affiliated armed groups for the attacks it said were an attempt to show that Iraq's security situation remained unstable.

The blasts hit just weeks before Baghdad plans to host an Arab League summit, which has been postponed because of regional turmoil and acrimony between Iraq's government and some Persian Gulf states.

"The attacks aimed to spark sectarian strife among the Iraqi people, and to prevent the Arab League meeting from being held," Parliament Speaker Osama al-Nujaifi said.

CITIES HIT

More than a dozen blasts and attacks hit other cities across Iraq from Mosul in the north to Hilla, south of Baghdad, many of them targeting police.

The violence was aimed at Shi'ite neighbourhoods but also against security forces, a frequent target of al Qaeda insurgents.

In Thursday's violence, one car bomb in the capital killed at least nine people and wounded 27 in the upmarket Karrada neighbourhood, hurling shrapnel into the next street and blowing out glass from nearby buildings.

Witnesses saw at four wrecked cars full of shrapnel and bloodied seats near an ice-cream shop at the site of another blast.

In the biggest attack outside the capital, a car bomb killed seven people and wounded 33 in the town of Balad, north of Baghdad.

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