Posted by NEWS on 23/5/2005, 17:27:11 LONDON, 21 May 2005 — Roughly 100 demonstrators invoking Osama Bin Laden and denouncing US President George W. Bush gathered outside the American Embassy here yesterday to protest alleged abuse of the Qur’an by US soldiers. The group included a Briton who was held in the US camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and claimed to have witnessed the desecration of the Islamic holy text by American soldiers. “The soldiers thought I was a dangerous man, a martial artist, so they liked to fight me,” Martin Mubanga told the crowd. “This was one of the methods they used, throwing the Qur’an, my Qur’an, on the floor in my cell.” The hundred or so protestors, including men who hid their faces in headscarves and at least a dozen women, chanted the name of the Al-Qaeda leader and warned Bush “you will pay, with your blood, with your head”. Some participants waved signs including one marked: “Desecrate today and see another 9/11 tomorrow”, referring to the 2001 terrorist attacks. A small group of protesters also set fire to an American flag and a wooden cross, before organizers appealed for calm. One of the event organizers, calling itself Supporters of Sharia, claimed that US desecration of the Qur’an happened all over the world, despite the retraction of a report describing such abuse taking place at Guantanamo Bay. The report that interrogators at the US detention center had flushed a Koran down the toilet to rattle Muslim inmates sparked riots in Afghanistan that left 15 people dead last week. Newsweek magazine, which published the report, this week retracted the story after its source developed doubts, and the Pentagon has said its own investigation has found no evidence to support the allegation. In London, Supporters of Sharia spokesman Abu Musa said the retraction “makes no difference, we have first-hand testimony.” “America is quite happy to desecrate the Qur’an all over the world... “Two countries, Afghanistan and Iraq, have been bombed into democracy and it is not something Muslims will tolerate,” he told the crowd. Mubanga said the abuse of his Qur’an happened during his first month at Camp Delta, but said that every time new US soldiers arrived they repeated the act with other prisoners, despite specific requests made to the authorities. Three other Britons formerly held at Camp Delta, the Guantanamo Bay site, and in Afghanistan claimed earlier this week they had seen US guards profane the Qur’an.
Muslims Hold Protest at US Embassy in London
Agence France Presse, Arab News
Message Thread:
« Back to thread