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Egypt condemns guards for Quran incidents
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-06-06 08:30

Egypt's Foreign Minister on Sunday condemned U.S. military guards and interrogators who desecrated the Quran at the military detention camp at Guantanamo Bay and said those responsible should be held accountable.

Egyptian officials informed their American counterparts of their position, Ahmed Aboul Gheit told Parliament, but he didn't say at what level. Egypt has been a key U.S. ally in the war on terror.

Members of Bangladesh Soldiers of Islam, the children wing of Youth Jamiyat, hold the Quran during an anti-U.S. protest in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Friday, June 3, 2005. The group was demonstrating against the alleged desecration of the Quran by U.S. soldiers in Guantanamo Bay. [AP]

A Pentagon report Friday confirmed incidents of desecration of Islam's holy book at the detention center for terrorist suspects, calling them relatively minor problems.

"We denounce in the strongest possible terms what the Pentagon confirmed about the desecration of the Quran," Aboul Gheit said during his first meeting with lawmakers since taking office last July. "We condemn whoever did this and we expect that they be held to account."

Also Sunday, Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del, said in Washington the United States should move toward shutting down the military prison camp in Cuba, calling it "the greatest propaganda tool that exists for recruiting of terrorists around the world."

Deadly clashes erupted in Afghanistan following a claim, reported and then retracted by Newsweek magazine, that U.S. interrogators had flushed a Quran down a toilet. After that report, thousands of angry protesters across the Middle East demanded an official apology from the United States, with some calling on their countries to sever relations with Washington.

Muslim protesters raise slogans at an anti-U.S. demonstration near the American Embassy in New Delhi, India, Thursday, June 2, 2005. More than 200 Muslim supporters belonging to the minority wing of Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party staged a protest march on Thursday, demanding an apology from the Bush administration for the alleged Quran abuse by American interrogators at Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba.[AP]

The Pentagon responded angrily to the Newsweek report, but confirmed late Friday that a U.S. soldier had deliberately kicked a prisoner's holy book.

The report also said prison guards threw water balloons in a cell block, causing an unspecified number of Qurans to get wet; a guard's urine splashed on a detainee and his Quran; an interrogator stepped on a Quran; and a two-word obscenity was written in English on a Quran's inside cover.

The findings are among the results of a probe last month by Guantanamo commander Brig. Gen. Jay Hood. Pentagon officials said the problems were relatively minor and that U.S. commanders had gone to great lengths to enable detainees to practice their religion.

About 540 detainees are in the prison camp, some held without charge for more than three years. Most were captured on the battlefields of Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002 and were sent to Guantanamo Bay in hope of extracting useful intelligence about the al-Qaida terrorist network.

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