Saturday, February 18, 2006

Cartoon protest turns deadly......Again

This story getting is monotonous, same people, same story, different location.

NIGERIAN rioters killed at least 15 people today after a Muslim protest against the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed descended into violence, a police spokesman said.

Witnesses said that protesters turned on the Christian minority in the northern city of Maiduguri, burning shops and churches, after police dispersed a rally called to condemn European newspapers that printed the caricatures.

A police spokesman, Deputy Commissioner Haz Iwendi said that army troops and police reinforcements had been deployed to the city and that a curfew had been imposed to bring about a return to order.

"We've arrested 115 people. Some 15 persons were killed by rioters, and 11 churches burnt," he said.

The victims were the first to die in Nigeria as anger over the drawings of Islam's prophet mounts among its 60 million Muslims, roughly half the population.

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