Posted on 05/14/2005 3:07:18 PM PDT by Cornpone
The Pakistani foreign minister has said that if reports that US guards at Guantanamo Bay desecrated the Koran are true, they should be severely punished. Khurshid Kasuri said that the allegations had provoked outrage throughout the Islamic world.
At least seven people died and many more were hurt in protests in Afghanistan this week over the issue.
The US has described the incident as abhorrent, and pledged prompt action if the allegations prove to be true.
A number of protest rallies were held in Pakistan on Friday.
'Outraged Muslims'
"Yes, it's abominable the reports that emanated from Guantanamo Bay," Mr Kasuri said during a three day diplomatic tour of Australia.
"It's unthinkable that someone could be so debased, inhuman, depraved as to provoke the feelings of not just those people there (in Guantanamo) but all over the Muslim world.
Protests in Pakistan have been relatively low key
"I have no doubt that the entire Muslim world is outraged. So I urge the United States administration to take very strong action against the culprits."
Mr Kasuri said while the US had "distanced itself" from the allegations, their seriousness required firm action.
He said that was especially the case in the light of similar allegations of prisoner abuse at the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq.
Unconditional apology
"In order to send a message, particularly about prison abuses ... I hope this time they take a much stronger action because the indignation and rage is universal."
"Even the worst enemy of the United States could not harm the image of the United States in the Muslim world as effectively as they've done if this is correct," he said.
There were demonstrations over the issue in several Pakistani cities after prayers on Friday, following days of protests and riots in neighbouring Afghanistan.
The US says it will investigate alleged Guantanamo abuses
The protests were organised by the six-party Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) alliance which called on the US to issue an unconditional apology or else it would step up its campaign to have the American ambassador expelled form the country.
But the BBC's Zaffar Abbas in Islamabad says that the protests were relatively small and largely peaceful.
Hafiz Hussain Ahmad, a leader of an opposition religious coalition, told worshippers at a packed mosque in Islamabad: "By insulting the Koran, they have challenged our belief. "We are hurt ... If we don't rise against Americans, if we don't give them a strong message today, they will do it again."
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice meanwhile appealed to Muslims to resist calls for violence, and promised that her country was investigating the allegations.
Ms Rice said on Thursday that desecration was abhorrent and disrespect for the Koran would not be tolerated.
The outrage in Afghanistan and Pakistan followed reports in Newsweek magazine that interrogators at the US Guantanamo Bay prison had flushed at least one copy of the Koran down a toilet.
Insulting the Koran or the Prophet Muhammad is regarded as blasphemy and punishable by death in both Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The US is holding about 520 inmates at Guantanamo Bay, many of them al-Qaeda and Taleban suspects captured in Pakistan and Afghanistan following the 11 September 2001 attacks in the US and subsequent US-led invasion of Afghanistan.
Here's the way my simple mind sees this whole thing. I have a john. I have a small stool in my john for when I use my john. I like to have something on my stool to read while I'm meditating in my john. Meditation can be informative. The scum at GITMO have a john. It is a very sparse john. There is no stool to place meditation materials on. Where shall we place the Koran, the only mediation material they are allowed? On the floor? No, let's place it on the top of the john. Ooops...one fell in? Let's start WWIII. Fine with me.
So you are saying we need to send some stools to Gitmo????
/s
regarding the TROP moniker: see my post:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1400732/posts?page=50#50
Your sarcastic wit is noted and appreciated but I don't think we should send stools to GITMO. I think we should burn all the Qur'ans there and send in the Mossad. Maybe we would learn something:)
US panel wants Pakistan blacklisted for violating religious freedomBut make it more punitive... ;o)"US panel wants Pakistan blacklisted for violating religious freedom," from AFP, with thanks to Nicolei:
WASHINGTON: A US Congress-mandated commission advised the government on Wednesday to blacklist Pakistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan for alleged violation of religious freedom and beliefs....
The State Department annually blacklists countries for alleged religious freedom violations based on recommendations from the commission, whose 10 members are jointly appointed by President George W. Bush and Congress.Last year, the department added Eritrea, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam to the blacklist, which already included China, Iran, Myanmar, North Korea and Sudan.
Yeah, I vote we raise the ante to a Crusade:)
This "Koran desecration" story seems more like something the Jihadis would start to incite the willingness to commit suicide by fighting the US Military..
Now I know some here are ranting, raveing, thumping there chests, but stop for a moment and THINK (we are conservatives after all and that's what we're suppsed to do) about what this war is REALLY all about.
"Anybody can become angry, that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, and to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way, that is not within everybody's power, that is not easy."
Aristotle
Flame away
Valin,
I understand your emotions but I have to disagree. First of all, they broke no law. There is no law against flushing paper down a toilet. It is done billions of times a day...for those who are fortunate enough to have paper. Second of all, these guards are kids. Do you really expect them to be aware of all the ramifications of every act they may commit in their day to day routines and how it may affect geopolitical dynamics. If that is the case, we need to stop recruiting anyone less than 28 years old, as was just suggested in a recent report, and send guys like me who have been a lot of places and seen a lot of things. No one would tell what I did. Get my drift?
You often have brilliant arguments, but I think you are wrong on this one...paper is paper.
Any toilet in the world, even Al Bundy's, would be dimensionally incapable of having any book, even a small book, flushed down it.
Even if a toilet could swallow a Koran, it would puke it back up immediately. Even turds have standards.
And please feel free to pass this post along to any muslims you know.
This is America, dammit. I'll flush anything I damn well please down my toilet, even if I AM in Cuba....
When the product is ready, write to me freepmail. I want to order a carton, for all of my Freeper friends for Christmas. Koran Wipes. Koran Kleenex. It's a winner!
I take it you're Irish?
Get over the childish irish accusation achmed...
The statement is an article title well noted round this forum, from one of their own experts/editors... or whatever.
Sorry, I'm an accuracy freak (the engineering profession is like that) and the key word here is "All".
If you had said 99% of terrorists are muslim, I would not have posted.
The word "All" belies the fact that Jerry Adams exists. Facts are stubborn things, but engineers have to deal with them on a daily basis. And no, I don't care to read the rest.
Didn't mean to piss you off, BTW.
And I'm of Irish heritage, but truth is truth.
I guess that would be "Gerry Adams". Caught myself two seconds after I posted.
Good point, and I agree.
I'll tell you from personal experience (and I don't mean this as a joke) it's not the easiest thing to do. I'm not even using one of those new eco-friendly toilets, and I have found flushing "used" pages of the quran down quite difficult, at times requiring several flushes for just a few ripped out pages at a time, since they tend to not be absorbent or go limp and soggy like regular TP.
I have no idea how anyone could flush a whole Quran down without great difficulty, or blocking the toilet up.
As for Cuba, and Camp X-ray... it's my understanding that they built a new detention facility there after 9/11 and I assume that means they are using the new style low-flush eco toilets (I can't vouch for the toilets there, since I'm fortunate enough to never have been an inmate or visitor to that facility) which would have a lot less flushing power than my own.
"I have no idea how anyone could flush a whole Quran down without great difficulty, or blocking the toilet up."
Now come on, admit it, you are in a much better position to make a judgement upon such scientific matters as the absorbancy of paper and the flushing strength of the average western toilet than any poor schmuck in Pakistan who does his business behind a tree and wipes himself left handed with a smooth rock - how's he going to work that out, hey? Don't you know that the holey koran is to the camel jockeys and sand fleas sacroscant as the Word direct from allah into mohammad's (camel urine be upon him) ear?
The leftist idiot who planted this story has just rid the world of a number of fanatics and with a bit of luck, it will grow into a world wide phenomenon, I'm keeping my eye on Indonesia, riots should start very shortly. If I didn't know better I would write to President Bush and tell him 'it's all your fault, congratulations, what a brilliant strategy that was, the fanatical islamists are eliminating themselves by the hundreds, hopefully soon by the thousands, hundreds of thousands maybe, and all you to do was start a rumour!' Yours sincerely, Fred Nerks.
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