Thousands rally in protest across Pak

Thousands of people rallied across Pakistan on Friday to protest the alleged desecration of the Koran by US forces at Guantanamo Bay prison ...

Thousands of people rallied across Pakistan on Friday to protest the alleged desecration of the Koran by US forces at Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba. The rallies, called by hardline Islamic groups opposed to Pakistan’s support for the US-led war on terrorism, came hours after a deadly bomb blast at a Muslim shrine in Islamabad that killed at least 25 people and wounded dozens of others.

‘‘We condemn sacrilege of the Koran by the US extremists,’’ said a banner held by women protesters at a rally in Islamabad attended by about 5,000 people in front of the parliament building about a km from the scene of the blast.

Protesters in the city of Quetta burned effigies of US President George W. Bush and his key allies in the war on terrorism—Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and Afghan President Hamid Karzai. ‘‘The desecration of Koran is part of the conspiracies against Muslims,’’ pro-Taliban leader and cleric Fazal-ur-Rehman told a rally in the northwestern city of Peshawar, close to the Afghan border. Similar protests were staged in Karachi, Multan and other cities.

Musharraf on Thursday raised the issue with Christina Rocca, US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs, and said Pakistanis were ‘‘deeply dismayed’’ by the alleged desecration of the Koran. ‘‘He (Musharraf) called for a full inquiry to bring to justice the perpetrators of this shameful act,’’ a foreign ministry statement said. —Reuters

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