Posted on 02/24/2006 6:32:21 PM PST by Cornpone
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Syria on Friday disputed U.S. charges it had incited mob violence over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, saying Damascus had done its best to protect embassies during violent protests and would pay for damages.
Dozens of Syrian police and security officers had been injured protecting foreign embassies during February 4 demonstrations in Damascus that started out peacefully but unexpectedly turned violent, Syrian U.N. Ambassador Fayssal Mekdad said in a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has accused Damascus of inciting the violence, saying Syria and also Iran had gone "out of their way to inflame sentiments and to use this to their own purposes."
Washington is in the midst of an international campaign to put pressure on Syria, accusing it of supporting terrorism, dominating Lebanon and backing insurgents in Iraq, charges Damascus denies.
Annan said this month Syria and Iran should pay for any damage caused by their failure to protect foreign embassies from mobs protesting over the cartoons, which first appeared in a Danish newspaper and triggered widespread protests across the Muslim world.
Mekdad, who was recently named Syria's vice foreign minister in a cabinet shuffle but remains in New York, accused Washington of "issuing statements having no basis in reality."
"They have twisted the facts and misrepresented the measures taken by the Syrian government," he said in the February 13 letter, circulated at the United Nations on Friday.
He said Syrian officials had apologized for the violence and pledged to pay for any damages in meetings with officials representing the European Union, the European Commission, Austria, Canada, Chile, Norway and Switzerland.
The Foreign Ministry was in the process of assessing the damage and has provided temporary quarters to the Chilean Embassy, he said.
MEMRI.org - Special Dispatch Series - No. 1089 "Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi Responds to Cartoons of Prophet Muhammad: Whoever is Angered and Does Not Rage in Anger is a Jackass - We are Not a Nation of Jackasses" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "In a February 3, 2006 Friday sermon, Sheikh Yousef Al-Qaradhawi, who is head of the European Council for Fatwa and Research, president of the International Association of Muslim Scholars (IAMS), and the spiritual guide of many other Islamist organizations across the world (including the Muslim Brotherhood), exhorted worshippers to show rage to the world over the Danish paper Jylland Posten's publication of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad. The sermon was aired on Qatar TV on February 3, 2006.") (February 9, 2006)
News.BBC.co.uk: "CARTOON PROTESTER WAS DRUG DEALER" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "A Muslim demonstrator who imitated a suicide bomber in London to protest over cartoons satirising the Prophet Muhammad is a convicted drug dealer. Omar Khayam, 22, of Bedford, was jailed in 2002 and released on licence last year after serving half of his sentence for dealing heroin and cocaine.") (Last updated February 7, 2006)
BRUSSELS JOURNAL.com: "'THE WAR IS ON'" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "Yesterday (Thursday) Mullah Krekar, the alleged leader of the Islamist group Ansar al-Islam who has been living in Norway as a refugee since 1991, said that the publication of the Muhammad cartoons was a declaration of war. "The war has begun," he told Norwegian journalists. Mr Krekar said Muslims in Norway are preparing to fight. "It does not matter if the governments of Norway and Denmark apologize, the war is on.") (February 3, 2006)
ISLAMONLINE.net: Cairo - "WARNINGS CARTOONS RISK VIOLENCE" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "The blasphemous cartoons of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) by a Danish daily and other European newspapers are risking to trigger acts of violence around the world, officials and commentators warn.") (February 2, 2006)
BRUSSELS JOURNAL.com: "OUR LADY OF CULTURAL DIFFERENCES" -from the Desk of Paul Belien (September 22, 2005)
INFOVLAD.net: "NEXT TARGET - DENMARK?" (October 15, 2005)
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