With the first deaths being reported from the uproar over caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, governments around the world rushed Monday to contain the damage, even as Iran blocked all ties with Denmark and demonstrations continued to rage across Europe and the Middle East.
From Washington to Copenhagen, from the Vatican to Lebanon, leaders searched for the words to salve the rage of Muslims angered by satirical representations of the prophet that have appeared in many European newspapers, while also trying to uphold the ideals of free expression.
In Washington, President George W. Bush's spokesman, Scott McClellan, said: "We condemn acts of violence wherever they occur in relation to the concerns over these cartoons, and that's why we urge all governments to take steps to lower tensions and prevent violence."
The United States accused the Syrian government of backing the protests in Lebanon and Syria over the weekend, an accusation also made by anti-Syrian Lebanese politicians.
The diplomacy was feverish as protests spread to more countries. Afghan soldiers opened fire on demonstrators Monday, killing at least five people. And a teenager died in Somalia when police officers fired into the air to disperse stone-throwing protesters, The Associated Press reported.
The worst violence occurred in Afghanistan outside the main U.S. military base at Bagram, north of the capital, Kabul, as 1,000 protesters fought with the Afghan police. Four protesters were killed and five were wounded as police officers tried to stop the protesters from breaking through the gate, police officials said. Eight policemen were wounded by stones thrown by demonstrators, they said.
Another protester was killed and two were wounded as hundreds of people demonstrated in the town of Mehtarlam, east of Kabul. Two police officers were also wounded, said a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, Yousuf Stanezai. He said that the police did not shoot and that the protester was killed by someone firing from the crowd.
Afghan officials blamed troublemakers in the crowd for the violence. Demonstrations in at least five other towns around Afghanistan passed without incident, officials reported.
In Kabul, youths carrying sticks threw stones at the Danish, British and French embassies and the UN head office. Protesters burned the Danish flag in front of the Danish Consulate and chanted "Death to America" and "Death to Denmark."
In Tehran, the Iranian police used tear gas to disperse protesters hurling stones and firebombs at the Danish Embassy. Some in the crowd of about 400 chanted "Death to Denmark" and "Death to Israel," while others held up caricatures of Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany. Earlier, 200 demonstrators threw stones at the Austrian Embassy, breaking some windows and starting small fires.
Lebanon apologized to Denmark on Monday after security forces failed to prevent demonstrators from burning down the Danish Consulate in Beirut. The country's main anti-Syrian coalition that holds the government together accused Syria of being behind the unrest. Security forces said more than 330 people had been arrested, more than half of them Syrians and Palestinians.
"The cabinet denounces the riots and the targeting of the Danish Embassy, which harms the image of a civilized Lebanon," the government said in a statement after a late-night meeting. "We present our apology to the state of Denmark."
Jyllands-Posten, the newspaper that provoked the furor by initially publishing the cartoons, said it was talking with representatives of Danish Muslim groups about a joint statement to calm tensions. Carsten Juste, the paper's editor, said the statement would contain an apology for offending Muslims, but would fall short of apologizing for publishing the cartoons.
At the Vatican, Archbishop Michael Fitzgerald, who is responsible for interfaith dialogue, called on Christians and Muslims to defuse their anger. "We all have the responsibility not to increase tension and to calm spirits on both sides," he said.
The White House tried to take an even-handed approach. McClellan, the spokesman, urged people who criticize the cartoons to "speak out forcefully against all forms of hate speech, including cartoons and articles throughout parts of the Arab world which frequently espouse anti-Semitic and anti-Christian views."
The White House previously spoke out against the publication of the cartoons, infuriating many officials in Denmark, who felt betrayed after supporting the U.S.-led war in Iraq in the face of strong opposition at home.
In Brussels, José Manuel Barroso, the president of the European Commission, met with EU officials in an effort to return to what he called "a peaceful debate." Johannes Laitenberg, spokesman for the commission, acknowledged that the cartoons had angered Muslims around the world. But he insisted that "no grievance, perceived or real, justifies acts of violence such as perpetrated on the weekend."
At an emergency meeting of EU diplomats in Brussels, EU ambassadors expressed solidarity with Denmark and warned that countries in the Middle East and elsewhere had an obligation to protect EU embassies. But EU officials said the bloc would not withhold aid to countries where violent attacks took place.
Denmark, meanwhile, issued a list of 14 Muslim countries its citizens should avoid, including Afghanistan and Algeria. EU officials also said the bloc was considering the creation of an EU media code of conduct that would set formal guidelines involving reporting about culturally sensitive issues.
The EU's justice commissioner, Franco Frattini, is concerned that the controversy over the caricatures may inflame relations between Christian, secular and Islamic Europeans.
Last September - just nine days before the Danish newspaper sparked the dispute by publishing 12 cartoons of Islam's founder - Frattini identified the media's reporting about Islam and terrorism as a central catalyst in the recruitment of extremists.
EU officials said the controversy over the cartoons could result in the EU's reviving long-dormant proposals to combat racism and religious hatred. Frattini pressed for such legislation last year. But some countries, including Sweden, are concerned that criminalizing hate speech could undermine freedom of expression, and EU officials say getting such legislation passed would be difficult.
Despite the efforts to quell the violence, demonstrations continued to rage across the Middle East. Several thousand Iraqis demonstrated in the southern city of Kut, burning Danish, German and Israeli flags, as well as an effigy of Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen of Denmark.
There was a death on Sunday, in Beirut, when demonstrators set fire to the Danish and Norwegian embassies and one protester, trapped by flames, died jumping from the building.
After the assaults on the embassies, Interior Minister Hassan al-Sabaa resigned.
Two thousand Islamists in Algeria staged a sit-in on Monday, a rare demonstration in a country still traumatized by a decade-long war against religious extremism.
"Muhammad's army will be back," demonstrators chanted during the two-and-a-half-hour protest in a gymnasium in the center of the capital, Algiers.
Protesters burned Danish and American flags and chanted verses from the Koran under the watchful eyes of dozens of plainclothes police officers.
In Rome, meanwhile, the Italian foreign minister, Gianfranco Fini, said that the worldwide protests against the publication of the cartoons were being "orchestrated."
"The reaction in the Islamic world makes one think that all this subversion is being orchestrated. Someone is fanning the flames," he said on the Italian state television network, RAI.
Carlotta Gall and Abdul Waheed Wafa of The New York Times contributed reporting to this article, respectively, from Kandahar and Kabul in Afghanistan.