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Three die in Pakistan cartoon riots
Wed Feb 15, 2006 9:16 AM ET168
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By Ali Imam

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Three people died and outlets of a Norwegian phone firm, a U.S. fast food restaurant and banks were set ablaze in Pakistan on Wednesday in renewed violence against cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad.

More than 20,000 people, including traders, students and Islamist radicals, took part in protests in cities in North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and the eastern city of Lahore.

Police said that while the majority of the protesters were peaceful, one man was killed in exchange of fire between students and police in Lahore, where two people died on Tuesday.

In Peshawar, an eight-year-old boy was killed by a bullet that had been fired into the air and a man was killed by a electricity pole which fell, police and hospital officials said.

Police fired tear gas in Peshawar and several other towns in NWFP to disperse small groups of protesters who set ablaze two franchises of Norwegian mobile telephone firm Telenor, a KFC fast food outlet, as well as banks and cinemas.

The protests have been the most serious in Pakistan -- the second-most populous Muslim nation and a key ally in the U.S.-led war on terrorism -- since European papers republished cartoons of the Prophet first printed in a Danish newspaper in September.

Many Muslims believe it is blasphemous to depict the Prophet.

On Tuesday, hundreds of mainly high school students stormed into the closely guarded diplomatic enclave in the capital Islamabad, forcing police to fire tear gas to disperse them.

Wednesday's violence in Lahore, capital of Punjab province, came despite a province-wide ban on street protests announced by its chief minister, Pervez Elahi, who warned on Tuesday that violators faced "an iron hand".

SUPPORTERS OF TALIBAN BLAMED

NWFP Chief Minister Mohammad Akram Durrani blamed the violence there on provocateurs he did not identify, while police in the town of Tank pointed to supporters of Afghanistan's radical Taliban guerrillas.    Continued ...

© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.


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