At least 12 people were killed Friday in an attack on a U.N. compound in Afghanistan that followed a demonstration against the reported burning last month of a Quran in Florida, authorities and a U.N. source with knowledge of the events said.
Eight workers for the United Nations and four Afghans were killed, said Abdul Rauof Taj, security director of Balkh province. At least 24 people were injured, he said.
In a written statement, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, citing preliminary reports, said it appeared that three international staffers and four international security officers were killed in the attack.
"Those who lost their lives in today's attack were dedicated to the cause of peace in Afghanistan and to a better life for all Afghans," he said.
A U.N .source said the dead included four Nepalese security guards as well as U.N. workers from Norway, Sweden and Romania. The U.N. Security Council was to meet Friday in closed session to discuss the attack.
Via Digby, we learn that UN staff on the ground in Afghanistan have a stunned, horrified, and resigned reaction.
Foreigners have been killed in Afghanistan before, and today’s attack was not the first fatal attack on UN staff. But it was different than previous fatal attacks. Very different. The killers were ordinary residents of a city deemed peaceful enough to be one of the first places transferred to the control of Afghan security forces. The men who broke into the UN compound, set fires and killed 8 people weren’t Taliban, or henchmen of a brutal warlord, or members of a criminal gang. They weren’t even armed when the protests began –they took weapons from the UN guards who were their first victims.
Foreigners committed to assisting in the rebuilding of Afghanistan have long accepted the possibility that they might die at the hands of warring parties, but this degree of violence from ordinary citizens is not something most of us factored into our decision to work here.
Tonight, the governor of Balkh province, of which Mazar-i-Sharif is the capital, is telling the international media that the men who sacked the UN compound were Taliban infiltrators. That’s rubbish. Local clerics drove around the city with megaphones yesterday, calling residents to protest the actions of a small group of attention-seeking, bigoted Americans. Then, during today’s protest, someone announced that not just one, but hundreds of Korans had been burned in America. A throng of enraged men rushed the gates of the UN compound, determined to draw blood. Had the attackers been gunmen, they would likely have been killed before they could breach the compound.
For his part, Pastor Terry Jones is damn proud. This is precisely what he wanted to provoke.
"We wanted to raise awareness of this dangerous religion and dangerous element," Jones said. "I think [today's attack] proves that there is a radical element of Islam."
Students of the civil rights movement in America in the 50's and 60's will no doubt see the similarities. Terry Jones got exactly what he wanted. He pushed a dangerous situation over the edge and into inexcusable violence.
It will not be long now before the cries go up from the wingers that this event proves that we must pass laws to Do Something About Them Before It's Too Late.
And sadly, I believe we will see those laws pass. Terry Jones won a huge battle here. The rest of thinking America lost.
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