 Some 5,000 Afghans chanted “death to Denmark” and “death to the Netherlands” in Kabul on Friday, protesting against the reprinting of a blasphemous cartoon in Danish newspapers and a Dutch film on the Quran.
| Afghanistan being free of any other problems, that was all they could come up with to be concerned about. |
Sporadic demonstrations have sprung up across the deeply conservative country in recent weeks against the cartoons and the film with protesters demanding Danish and Dutch troops be withdrawn from Afghanistan and their embassies shut down. Protesters gathered around a mosque in the west of the Afghan capital after Friday prayers chanting “death to Denmark”, “death to the Netherlands," “death to America” and “death to Jews”.
| That's kinda the key to the whole thing, isn't it? To most Afghans -- all but the few who've been out of the country elsewhere than Pakistain -- Jews are theoretical constructs. They've never actually seen one in the flesh, never actually talked to one, but they know they don't like 'em. Because they're ucky. |
Demonstrators burned Danish and Dutch flags and also an effigy of Dutch right-wing politician Geert Wilders, who is due to release a film thought to be critical of the Quran later this month. One unidentified speaker addressing the angry crowd through a megaphone from the back of a truck said the Afghan government should expel Danish and Dutch troops and close their embassies within two days or “we will take action”.
| Sounds like the Pak Taliban, doesn't it? Or maybe the TNSM. Or Lal Masjid. Or any of the dozens of unorganized organizations consisting of grandiose names and a handful of lunatics. |
The Netherlands has some 1,650 troops, mainly in southern Afghanistan and 14 Dutch soldiers have been killed fighting Taliban militants. Denmark, meanwhile, has 550 troops in northern and southern Afghanistan and 11 of its soldiers have been killed.
| I take it there's no Pashtun word for 'gratitude'. |
Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden this week warned that Europe would be punished for the cartoons, first published by a Danish paper in September 2005.
| But really, this has nothing to do with that. No sirree. |
The images ignited violent protests across the world, including in Afghanistan, when newspapers around the world reprinted them the following year. |