Anti-US protests heat up in Pakistan

Pakistani police opened fire on anti-American demonstrators who held up pictures of Osama bin Laden and shouted "Death to America" in several cities yesterday, protesting against US-led strikes on Afghanistan.

Smoke hung over the western city of Quetta as police battled thousands of pro-Taleban demonstrators who set on fire cinemas, shops, a bank, a truck and an office of Pakistan's Central Investigations Agency.

Police fired into the air to disperse crowds and used teargas and batons in another part of Quetta, close to Afghanistan's southern border.

Police also fired teargas to break up protests in Peshawar, near the Afghan border, where students and some Afghan refugees tried to demonstrate against the attacks.

Students tried to block a road in one part of the city. In another, police fired teargas to force several hundred protesters back into a mosque.

Up the Khyber Pass in Landi Kotal, local militia opened fire to control about 5000 Pashtun tribesmen burning an effigy of President George W. Bush. Three protesters were injured.

In Karachi, pro-Taleban protesters blocked streets leading to the business centre and angry crowds burnt tyres and threw stones at vehicles.

Armoured vehicles with mounted machine guns were parked opposite the US consulate in Karachi. Police and paramilitary rangers guarded key installations.

Security was tightened at airports, ports, railway stations, power stations and government offices.

In the capital, Islamabad, United Nations staff were asked to stay at home, as 1000 student protesters, some armed with sticks or swords and chanting Islamic slogans, marched to the capital's American Center. Police in riot gear surrounded them.

"If helping poor Afghanistan is terrorism, then we are all terrorists," one student shouted.