Security Message for U.S. Citizens: Temporary Closure of U.S. Embassy Islamabad on Monday, September 17, 2012
This security message informs U.S. citizens that public services at the
U.S. Embassy in Islamabad will be temporarily suspended on Monday,
September 17, 2012 due to the potential for demonstrations in the vicinity
of the Embassy. The Embassy will continue to make every effort to provide
emergency services to U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens should contact (92-51)
208-0000 for emergency American Citizens Services.
For more information on the risks of travel to Pakistan, please see
the Department
of State's most recent Travel Warning by clicking
here.
Updated Information on Travel and Security
Updated information on travel and security in Pakistan may be obtainedfrom
the Department of State by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll-free in the United
States and Canada or, for callers outside the United States and Canada, on
a regular toll line at 1-202-501-4444. These numbers are available from
8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S.
federal holidays). For further information, please consult the Travel
Warning for Pakistan and the Country Specific Information for Pakistan, as
well as the Worldwide Caution. You can also stay up to date by bookmarking
our Bureau of Consular Affairs website, which also contains current Travel
Warnings and Travel Alerts. Follow us on Twitter and the Bureau of Consular
Affairs page on Facebook, and download our free Smart Traveler iPhone App
to have travel information at your fingertips.
U.S. citizens traveling to or living in Pakistan are encouraged to enroll
in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP). If you enroll we can keep
you up to date with important safety and security announcements and can
also help your family and friends get in touch with you in an emergency.
U.S. citizens without Internet access may enroll directly with the nearest
U.S. Embassy or Consulate.
To view emergency services to U.S. citizens in the different consular
districts, please click on the links below:
Contact Information for all U.S. Mission to Pakistan Posts
- The U.S. Embassy in Islamabad is located at Diplomatic Enclave, Ramna 5; telephone (92-51) 208-0000; Consular Section telephone (92-51) 208-2700; fax (92-51) 282-2632; e-mail address:ACSIslamabad@state.gov.
- The U.S. Consulate General Karachi, located at Plot No 3-5, TPX Area, Mai Kolachi Road, Karachi, provides services to U.S. citizens by appointment only. Services can be scheduled by calling (92-21) 3527-5000 between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m., Monday-Friday; fax (92-21) 3527-5885; website: http://karachi.usconsulate.gov/; e-mail: ACSKarachi@state.gov.
- The U.S. Consulate General in Lahore is located at 50- Sharah-E-Abdul Hameed Bin Badees, (Old Empress Road) near Shimla Hill Rotary; telephone (92-42) 3603-4000 or 3603-4250; fax (92-42)3603-4200; e-mail address: ACSLahore@state.gov.
- The U.S. Consulate General in Peshawar is located at 11 Hospital Road, Cantonment, Peshawar; telephone (92- 1)526-8800; fax (92-91) 527-6712; e-mail address: ACSPeshawar@state.gov.
Security Message for U.S. Citizens: Temporary Closure of U.S. Embassy Islamabad on Monday, September 17, 2012
This security message informs U.S. citizens that public services at the
U.S. Embassy in Islamabad will be temporarily suspended on Monday,
September 17, 2012 due to the potential for demonstrations in the vicinity
of the Embassy. The Embassy will continue to make every effort to provide
emergency services to U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens should contact (92-51)
208-0000 for emergency American Citizens Services.
For more information on the risks of travel to Pakistan, please see
the Department
of State's most recent Travel Warning by clicking
here.
U.S. Embassy in Islamabad will be temporarily suspended on Monday,
September 17, 2012 due to the potential for demonstrations in the vicinity
of the Embassy. The Embassy will continue to make every effort to provide
emergency services to U.S. citizens. U.S. citizens should contact (92-51)
208-0000 for emergency American Citizens Services.
For more information on the risks of travel to Pakistan, please see
the Department
of State's most recent Travel Warning by clicking
here.
Updated Information on Travel and Security
Updated information on travel and security in Pakistan may be obtainedfrom
the Department of State by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll-free in the United
States and Canada or, for callers outside the United States and Canada, on
a regular toll line at 1-202-501-4444. These numbers are available from
8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S.
federal holidays). For further information, please consult the Travel
Warning for Pakistan and the Country Specific Information for Pakistan, as
well as the Worldwide Caution. You can also stay up to date by bookmarking
our Bureau of Consular Affairs website, which also contains current Travel
Warnings and Travel Alerts. Follow us on Twitter and the Bureau of Consular
Affairs page on Facebook, and download our free Smart Traveler iPhone App
to have travel information at your fingertips.
U.S. citizens traveling to or living in Pakistan are encouraged to enroll
in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP). If you enroll we can keep
you up to date with important safety and security announcements and can
also help your family and friends get in touch with you in an emergency.
U.S. citizens without Internet access may enroll directly with the nearest
U.S. Embassy or Consulate.
Updated information on travel and security in Pakistan may be obtainedfrom
the Department of State by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll-free in the United
States and Canada or, for callers outside the United States and Canada, on
a regular toll line at 1-202-501-4444. These numbers are available from
8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S.
federal holidays). For further information, please consult the Travel
Warning for Pakistan and the Country Specific Information for Pakistan, as
well as the Worldwide Caution. You can also stay up to date by bookmarking
our Bureau of Consular Affairs website, which also contains current Travel
Warnings and Travel Alerts. Follow us on Twitter and the Bureau of Consular
Affairs page on Facebook, and download our free Smart Traveler iPhone App
to have travel information at your fingertips.
U.S. citizens traveling to or living in Pakistan are encouraged to enroll
in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP). If you enroll we can keep
you up to date with important safety and security announcements and can
also help your family and friends get in touch with you in an emergency.
U.S. citizens without Internet access may enroll directly with the nearest
U.S. Embassy or Consulate.
To view emergency services to U.S. citizens in the different consular
districts, please click on the links below:
districts, please click on the links below:
Contact Information for all U.S. Mission to Pakistan Posts
- The U.S. Embassy in Islamabad is located at Diplomatic Enclave, Ramna 5; telephone (92-51) 208-0000; Consular Section telephone (92-51) 208-2700; fax (92-51) 282-2632; e-mail address:ACSIslamabad@state.gov.
- The U.S. Consulate General Karachi, located at Plot No 3-5, TPX Area, Mai Kolachi Road, Karachi, provides services to U.S. citizens by appointment only. Services can be scheduled by calling (92-21) 3527-5000 between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m., Monday-Friday; fax (92-21) 3527-5885; website: http://karachi.usconsulate.gov/; e-mail: ACSKarachi@state.gov.
- The U.S. Consulate General in Lahore is located at 50- Sharah-E-Abdul Hameed Bin Badees, (Old Empress Road) near Shimla Hill Rotary; telephone (92-42) 3603-4000 or 3603-4250; fax (92-42)3603-4200; e-mail address: ACSLahore@state.gov.
- The U.S. Consulate General in Peshawar is located at 11 Hospital Road, Cantonment, Peshawar; telephone (92- 1)526-8800; fax (92-91) 527-6712; e-mail address: ACSPeshawar@state.gov.
Pakistanis Try to Storm U.S. Outpost; One Is Killed
By SALMAN MASOOD
Published: September 16, 2012
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — One person was killed and dozens of people were injured when anti-American protesters tried to storm the American Consulate in the southern port city of Karachi and clashed for several hours with the police and paramilitary troops on Sunday evening, rescue workers and police officials said.
The outbreak of violence came after days of peaceful demonstrations in Pakistan against the release of an American-made video mocking the Prophet Muhammad. Pakistani officials had increased security in all major cities before Friday Prayer services, which have in the past served as flash points for protests, and until Sunday, calm had prevailed. The American Embassy here said in a message posted Sunday evening on Twitter that “all American personnel are safe and accounted for at U.S. Consulate, Karachi.”
“The United States government has absolutely nothing to do with this video,” another Twitter message by the American Embassy said. “We reject its content and its message.”
Karachi is Pakistan’s commercial capital, and the sprawling city is frequently torn by ethnic and sectarian violence. “Things usually get out of hand in Karachi,” Mehreen Zahra-Malik, an assistant editor at The News International, said in an interview.
The demonstration on Sunday was spearheaded by two groups of Shiites, a minority in Pakistan, which had urged demonstrators to march “toward” the American Consulate.
The police responded by blocking the road that leads to the American Consulate with concrete barriers and shipping containers on Sunday afternoon. Then, as the march neared, the police fired tear gas canisters into the crowd. That failed to contain waves of angry demonstrators, who grew increasingly agitated, witnesses said.
The police and Rangers, a force controlled by the Interior Ministry, then fired shots into the air as demonstrators rushed through the clouds of tear gas, trying to reach the outer boundary wall of the heavily fortified consulate building. Water cannons were also used on the protesters, who began hurling stones.
Local television broadcast images of young men falling on the roadside after being struck by water jets. One young man ran toward a police officer, who was firing warning shots in the air, and flung his arms open, daring the officer to shoot at his chest.
After battling for a few hours without entering the consulate property, the protesters dispersed. They later assembled in the Numaish Chowrangi neighborhood and staged a sit-in. Local news media reported that the demonstrators had set at least four police vehicles on fire.
Mirza Yousuf Hussain, the leader of one of the two Shiite groups that organized the protest, claimed that violence had broken out in Karachi after police opened fire on “peaceful protesters.” He said in a statement that police fire had killed the brother of the deputy secretary general of his party’s Karachi chapter. He also said two wounded workers were in critical condition. He accused high-ranking police officers of “working to protect American interests.”
read more at http://www.nytimes.com/
Pakistani Politician Warns of US Plot to Misuse Embassy Events in Libya
TEHRAN (FNA)- Deputy Head of Majlis Wahdat Muslimeen (MWM) Allama Ameen Shahidi condemned a film recently produced by a US-Israeli man against Islam and voiced support for Muslim protests against the movie, but meantime warned that Washington plots to misuse the relevant events in Libya.
Outrage has been growing across the Muslim world over the five-million-US dollar movie that was financed by more than 100 Jews and produced by an American-Israeli man.
On Tuesday and after a trailer of the blasphemous movie took people in Egypt to the streets, people in Libya staged similar protest rallies which led to some clashes at the US consulate in the Eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, and Washington claims that its ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three staff members of the US consulate were killed in the clashes at the consulate building.
Following the events at the US consulate in Benghazi, the US evacuated all its diplomats in Libya and several other regional countries, but it then dispatched several warships to the Libyan coasts and deployed hundreds of marines and special forces in the country under the pretext of protecting the life of the Untied States' diplomatic corps in there.
In relevant remarks on Sunday, Allama Ameen Shahidi told FNA that "the US wants to misuse the events after the attack on its embassy in Libya similar to (what it did after) the September 11 (2011) incident".
He said that attacking the US mission in Libya was an Israeli plot to divert the public opinion from the main issue which is insult to Muslims in a blasphemous movie, reminding that Israelis had earlier used a similar tactic in the September 11 attacks against the New York Twin Towers, which was later used to wage war on the two Muslim nations of Afghanistan and Iraq.
The anti-Islam film has drawn condemnation from numerous countries including Afghanistan, Egypt, Libya, Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Morocco, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, etc.
read more at http://english.farsnews.com/
Protests across Pakistan against anti-Islam film
Pakistani Muslim protesters cross barbed wires as they attempt to reach the US embassy during a demonstration against the anti-Islam film in Islamabad on September 14, 2012. – AFP Photo
ISLAMABAD: Hundreds of people demonstrated in cities around Pakistan on Friday to denounce an anti-Islam movie, with some urging death for the film-maker and others demanding the expulsion of US diplomats.
The low-budget movie, entitled “Innocence of Muslims”, which has sparked fury across the Muslim world, pokes fun at the Prophet Mohammed and touches on themes of paedophilia and homosexuality.
Police beefed up security around US missions in Pakistan after violent attacks on American consulates and embassies in Egypt, Libya and Yemen this week, but protests in the country’s major cities on Friday passed off largely without incident.
In the eastern city of Lahore, Hafiz Saeed, head of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa charity, seen as a front for a banned militant organisation, led a 500-strong rally against the film.
Saeed – who has a $10 million US government bounty on him – urged the Pakistan government to summon the American ambassador to protest over the film.
“We condemn this conspiracy of producing (an) anti-Islam film. Such blasphemous acts are intentional conspiracies from the US and we will not tolerate it,” he told the rally.
Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) organised a rally in Karachi, where around 700 party activists and supporters gathered with banners and placards bearing anti-US and anti-Israel slogans.
“Hang the filmmaker…hang the apostate,” they chanted. “Jihad is the only treatment to cure American cancer,” another slogan said.
Around 400 protesters rallied in front of Islamabad’s Red Mosque after Friday prayers, following a call from JI.
They called for the handover of Terry Jones, an American Christian pastor linked with the film, who has drawn protests in the past for burning the Quran.
“Terry Jones should be handed to us for a trial in the sharia court,” a speaker at the rally told the gathering. Sharia courts try defendants according to Islamic law.
Another speaker called for closure of the US embassy and the expulsion of the US ambassador and other diplomats from Pakistan.
Elsewhere in the capital, there were two smaller demonstrations against the film, one of which led to brief scuffles with police.
In Peshawar, the northwestern city on the edge of the lawless tribal areas where anti-US feeling runs high, around 150 gathered after Friday prayers, chanting “Death to America”.
Al-Qaida calls for more attacks on embassies
- Associated Press
CAIRO — Al-Qaida's most active branch in the Middle East called for more attacks on U.S. embassies Saturday to "set the fires blazing," seeking to co-opt outrage over an anti-Muslim film even as the wave of protests that swept 20 countries this week eased.
Senior Muslim religious authorities issued their strongest pleas yet against resorting to violence, trying to defuse Muslim anger over the film a day after new attacks on U.S. and Western embassies that left at least eight protesters dead.
The top cleric in U.S. ally Saudi Arabia denounced the film but said it can't really hurt Islam, a contrast to protesters' frequently heard cries that the movie amounts to a humiliating attack that requires retaliation. He urged Muslims not to be "dragged by anger" into violence. The head of the Sunni Muslim world's pre-eminent religious institution, Egypt's Al-Azhar, backed peaceful protests but said Muslims should counter the movie by reviving Islam's moderate ideas.
In the Egyptian capital Cairo, where the first protests against the movie that denigrates the Prophet Muhammad erupted, police finally succeeded in clearing away protesters who had been clashing with security forces for days near the U.S. Embassy. Police arrested 220 people and a concrete wall was erected across the road leading to the embassy.
No significant protests were reported in the Mideast Saturday; the only report of violence linked to the film came from Australia, where riot police clashed with about 200 protesters at the U.S. Consulate in Sydney.
In his weekly radio and Internet address, President Barack Obama paid tribute to the four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, who were killed in an armed attack on the U.S. Consulate in the eastern Libyan city on Benghazi this week. He also denounced the anti-U.S. mob protests that followed.
"I have made it clear that the United States has a profound respect for people of all faiths. We stand for religious freedom. And we reject the denigration of religion - including Islam," Obama said.
"Yet there is never any justification for violence. There is no religion that condones the targeting of innocent men and women."
In Afghanistan, the Taliban claimed responsibility for an attack the night before by 20 insurgents on a sprawling British based in southern Afghanistan that killed two U.S. Marines. The Taliban said the attack was to avenge Muslims insulted by the film. It also said the attack came because Britain's Prince Harry is serving at the base, though British officials said he was far from the site of the attack and was unharmed.
Friday's demonstrations spread to more than 20 countries in the Middle East, Africa and Southeast Asia. While most were peaceful, marches in several places exploded into violence.
In Sudan, crowds torched part of the German Embassy and tried to storm the American Embassy. Protesters climbed the walls into the U.S. Embassy in Tunis, torching cars in the parking lot, trashing the entrance building and setting fire to a gym and a neighboring American school.
Four demonstrators were killed in Tunisia, two in Sudan, one in Lebanon and one in Egypt - the first Egyptian protester to die in clashes with police since Islamist President Mohammed Morsi took up his post this summer. On Thursday, four Yemeni protesters were killed in protests that turned violent at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa.
The Yemen-based al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, considered the most dangerous of the terror network's branches to the U.S., called the killing of Stevens "the best example" for those attacking embassies to follow.
"What has happened is a great event, and these efforts should come together in one goal, which is to expel the embassies of America from the lands of the Muslims," the group said. It called on protests to continue in Muslim nations "to set the fires blazing at these embassies."
It also called on "our Muslim brothers in Western nations to fulfill their duties in supporting God's prophet ... because they are the most capable of reaching them and vexing them."
The U.S called the Yemen al-Qaida branch the most dangerous threat after it plotted a series of attempted attacks , including the Christmas 2009 failed bombing of a passenger jet. It has suffered a series of blows since, including the recent killing in a drone strike of its number two-leader, Saeed al-Shihri. Yemen's U.S.-backed government has been waging an offensive against the group, taking back territory and cities in the south that the group's fighters seized last year.
So far, there has been no evidence of a direct role by al-Qaida in the protests.
U.S. and Libyan officials are investigating whether the protests were a cover for militants, possibly al-Qaida sympathizers, to carry out a coordinated attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi and kill Americans. Washington has deployed FBI investigators to try and track down militants behind the attack.
The United States sent an elite, 50-member Marine unit to Yemen's capital to bolster security at the embassy there, which protesters broke into on Thursday and then tried again to assault Friday. A similar team was dispatched to Tripoli, Libya, on Wednesday after the deadly attack the night before on the Benghazi consulate.
But the Sudanese government said Saturday it had refused to allow a similar Marine deployment to the embassy in Khartoum. Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Karti declined the request, saying Sudan is capable of protecting diplomatic missions, the state news agency said.
State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Sudan's government "has recommitted itself both publicly and privately to continue to protect our mission." She said the U.S. has requested additional security precautions.
Later in the day, the State Department issued a travel warning for Sudan and Tunisia, ordering home non-essential personnel and family members of staff at posts in both countries over security concerns.
The department added that while Sudan's government has taken steps to limit the activities of terrorist groups, some remain there and have threatened to attack Western interests. The terrorist threat level remains critical, it said.
Elsewhere in the region, security was increased Saturday at several spots that had been targeted.
Police in Lebanon beefed up their presence around U.S. fast food restaurants Saturday, after angry crowds Friday set fire to a KFC and a Hardee's restaurant in the port city of Tripoli. In Tunisia, the U.S. Embassy compound and school were surrounded by police and army vehicles Saturday.
The protests were sparked by an obscure, amateurish movie called "Innocence of Muslims" that depicts Muhammad as a fraud, a womanizer and a pedophile. A 14-minute "trailer" for the movie, dubbed into Arabic, was posted on YouTube.
The top religious authority in Saudi Arabia, Grand Mufti Sheik Abdel-Aziz al-Sheik, condemned the movie on Saturday but said it "will not harm" Islam or Muhammad.
"Muslims should not be dragged by wrath and anger to shift from legitimate to forbidden actions. By this, they will unknowingly fulfill some aims of the film," he said.
The head of al-Azhar, Sheik Ahmed al-Tayeb, called on the United Nations to take a stand against hate speech, pointing out that the world body has done so in defense of Jewish people.
He said that while defending the Prophet Muhammad is a duty for all Muslims - it should be "not only through peaceful protests ... but also through reviving his teachings in all walks of life and spreading his moderate ideas."
In the U.S., the man behind the movie was questioned at a California sheriff's station early Saturday by federal probation officers investigating whether he had violated terms of his five-year probation. Nakoula Basseley Nakoula wasn't arrested or detained.
read more at http://www.thestate.com
| |||
Outrage has been growing across the Muslim world over the five-million-US dollar movie that was financed by more than 100 Jews and produced by an American-Israeli man.
On Tuesday and after a trailer of the blasphemous movie took people in Egypt to the streets, people in Libya staged similar protest rallies which led to some clashes at the US consulate in the Eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, and Washington claims that its ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens and three staff members of the US consulate were killed in the clashes at the consulate building. Following the events at the US consulate in Benghazi, the US evacuated all its diplomats in Libya and several other regional countries, but it then dispatched several warships to the Libyan coasts and deployed hundreds of marines and special forces in the country under the pretext of protecting the life of the Untied States' diplomatic corps in there. In relevant remarks on Sunday, Allama Ameen Shahidi told FNA that "the US wants to misuse the events after the attack on its embassy in Libya similar to (what it did after) the September 11 (2011) incident". He said that attacking the US mission in Libya was an Israeli plot to divert the public opinion from the main issue which is insult to Muslims in a blasphemous movie, reminding that Israelis had earlier used a similar tactic in the September 11 attacks against the New York Twin Towers, which was later used to wage war on the two Muslim nations of Afghanistan and Iraq. The anti-Islam film has drawn condemnation from numerous countries including Afghanistan, Egypt, Libya, Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Iran, Yemen, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Morocco, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, etc.
read more at http://english.farsnews.com/
Protests across Pakistan against anti-Islam film
Pakistani Muslim protesters cross barbed wires as they attempt to reach the US embassy during a demonstration against the anti-Islam film in Islamabad on September 14, 2012. – AFP Photo
ISLAMABAD: Hundreds of people demonstrated in cities around Pakistan on Friday to denounce an anti-Islam movie, with some urging death for the film-maker and others demanding the expulsion of US diplomats.
The low-budget movie, entitled “Innocence of Muslims”, which has sparked fury across the Muslim world, pokes fun at the Prophet Mohammed and touches on themes of paedophilia and homosexuality.
Police beefed up security around US missions in Pakistan after violent attacks on American consulates and embassies in Egypt, Libya and Yemen this week, but protests in the country’s major cities on Friday passed off largely without incident.
In the eastern city of Lahore, Hafiz Saeed, head of the Jamaat-ud-Dawa charity, seen as a front for a banned militant organisation, led a 500-strong rally against the film.
Saeed – who has a $10 million US government bounty on him – urged the Pakistan government to summon the American ambassador to protest over the film.
“We condemn this conspiracy of producing (an) anti-Islam film. Such blasphemous acts are intentional conspiracies from the US and we will not tolerate it,” he told the rally.
Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) organised a rally in Karachi, where around 700 party activists and supporters gathered with banners and placards bearing anti-US and anti-Israel slogans.
“Hang the filmmaker…hang the apostate,” they chanted. “Jihad is the only treatment to cure American cancer,” another slogan said.
Around 400 protesters rallied in front of Islamabad’s Red Mosque after Friday prayers, following a call from JI.
They called for the handover of Terry Jones, an American Christian pastor linked with the film, who has drawn protests in the past for burning the Quran.
“Terry Jones should be handed to us for a trial in the sharia court,” a speaker at the rally told the gathering. Sharia courts try defendants according to Islamic law.
Another speaker called for closure of the US embassy and the expulsion of the US ambassador and other diplomats from Pakistan.
Elsewhere in the capital, there were two smaller demonstrations against the film, one of which led to brief scuffles with police.
In Peshawar, the northwestern city on the edge of the lawless tribal areas where anti-US feeling runs high, around 150 gathered after Friday prayers, chanting “Death to America”.
Al-Qaida calls for more attacks on embassies
- Associated Press
CAIRO — Al-Qaida's most active branch in the Middle East called for more attacks on U.S. embassies Saturday to "set the fires blazing," seeking to co-opt outrage over an anti-Muslim film even as the wave of protests that swept 20 countries this week eased.
Senior Muslim religious authorities issued their strongest pleas yet against resorting to violence, trying to defuse Muslim anger over the film a day after new attacks on U.S. and Western embassies that left at least eight protesters dead.
The top cleric in U.S. ally Saudi Arabia denounced the film but said it can't really hurt Islam, a contrast to protesters' frequently heard cries that the movie amounts to a humiliating attack that requires retaliation. He urged Muslims not to be "dragged by anger" into violence. The head of the Sunni Muslim world's pre-eminent religious institution, Egypt's Al-Azhar, backed peaceful protests but said Muslims should counter the movie by reviving Islam's moderate ideas.
In the Egyptian capital Cairo, where the first protests against the movie that denigrates the Prophet Muhammad erupted, police finally succeeded in clearing away protesters who had been clashing with security forces for days near the U.S. Embassy. Police arrested 220 people and a concrete wall was erected across the road leading to the embassy.
No significant protests were reported in the Mideast Saturday; the only report of violence linked to the film came from Australia, where riot police clashed with about 200 protesters at the U.S. Consulate in Sydney.
In his weekly radio and Internet address, President Barack Obama paid tribute to the four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, who were killed in an armed attack on the U.S. Consulate in the eastern Libyan city on Benghazi this week. He also denounced the anti-U.S. mob protests that followed.
"I have made it clear that the United States has a profound respect for people of all faiths. We stand for religious freedom. And we reject the denigration of religion - including Islam," Obama said.
"Yet there is never any justification for violence. There is no religion that condones the targeting of innocent men and women."
In Afghanistan, the Taliban claimed responsibility for an attack the night before by 20 insurgents on a sprawling British based in southern Afghanistan that killed two U.S. Marines. The Taliban said the attack was to avenge Muslims insulted by the film. It also said the attack came because Britain's Prince Harry is serving at the base, though British officials said he was far from the site of the attack and was unharmed.
Friday's demonstrations spread to more than 20 countries in the Middle East, Africa and Southeast Asia. While most were peaceful, marches in several places exploded into violence.
In Sudan, crowds torched part of the German Embassy and tried to storm the American Embassy. Protesters climbed the walls into the U.S. Embassy in Tunis, torching cars in the parking lot, trashing the entrance building and setting fire to a gym and a neighboring American school.
Four demonstrators were killed in Tunisia, two in Sudan, one in Lebanon and one in Egypt - the first Egyptian protester to die in clashes with police since Islamist President Mohammed Morsi took up his post this summer. On Thursday, four Yemeni protesters were killed in protests that turned violent at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa.
The Yemen-based al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, considered the most dangerous of the terror network's branches to the U.S., called the killing of Stevens "the best example" for those attacking embassies to follow.
"What has happened is a great event, and these efforts should come together in one goal, which is to expel the embassies of America from the lands of the Muslims," the group said. It called on protests to continue in Muslim nations "to set the fires blazing at these embassies."
It also called on "our Muslim brothers in Western nations to fulfill their duties in supporting God's prophet ... because they are the most capable of reaching them and vexing them."
The U.S called the Yemen al-Qaida branch the most dangerous threat after it plotted a series of attempted attacks , including the Christmas 2009 failed bombing of a passenger jet. It has suffered a series of blows since, including the recent killing in a drone strike of its number two-leader, Saeed al-Shihri. Yemen's U.S.-backed government has been waging an offensive against the group, taking back territory and cities in the south that the group's fighters seized last year.
So far, there has been no evidence of a direct role by al-Qaida in the protests.
U.S. and Libyan officials are investigating whether the protests were a cover for militants, possibly al-Qaida sympathizers, to carry out a coordinated attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi and kill Americans. Washington has deployed FBI investigators to try and track down militants behind the attack.
The United States sent an elite, 50-member Marine unit to Yemen's capital to bolster security at the embassy there, which protesters broke into on Thursday and then tried again to assault Friday. A similar team was dispatched to Tripoli, Libya, on Wednesday after the deadly attack the night before on the Benghazi consulate.
But the Sudanese government said Saturday it had refused to allow a similar Marine deployment to the embassy in Khartoum. Sudanese Foreign Minister Ali Karti declined the request, saying Sudan is capable of protecting diplomatic missions, the state news agency said.
State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Sudan's government "has recommitted itself both publicly and privately to continue to protect our mission." She said the U.S. has requested additional security precautions.
Later in the day, the State Department issued a travel warning for Sudan and Tunisia, ordering home non-essential personnel and family members of staff at posts in both countries over security concerns.
The department added that while Sudan's government has taken steps to limit the activities of terrorist groups, some remain there and have threatened to attack Western interests. The terrorist threat level remains critical, it said.
Elsewhere in the region, security was increased Saturday at several spots that had been targeted.
Police in Lebanon beefed up their presence around U.S. fast food restaurants Saturday, after angry crowds Friday set fire to a KFC and a Hardee's restaurant in the port city of Tripoli. In Tunisia, the U.S. Embassy compound and school were surrounded by police and army vehicles Saturday.
The protests were sparked by an obscure, amateurish movie called "Innocence of Muslims" that depicts Muhammad as a fraud, a womanizer and a pedophile. A 14-minute "trailer" for the movie, dubbed into Arabic, was posted on YouTube.
The top religious authority in Saudi Arabia, Grand Mufti Sheik Abdel-Aziz al-Sheik, condemned the movie on Saturday but said it "will not harm" Islam or Muhammad.
"Muslims should not be dragged by wrath and anger to shift from legitimate to forbidden actions. By this, they will unknowingly fulfill some aims of the film," he said.
The head of al-Azhar, Sheik Ahmed al-Tayeb, called on the United Nations to take a stand against hate speech, pointing out that the world body has done so in defense of Jewish people.
He said that while defending the Prophet Muhammad is a duty for all Muslims - it should be "not only through peaceful protests ... but also through reviving his teachings in all walks of life and spreading his moderate ideas."
In the U.S., the man behind the movie was questioned at a California sheriff's station early Saturday by federal probation officers investigating whether he had violated terms of his five-year probation. Nakoula Basseley Nakoula wasn't arrested or detained.
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