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Neon Tommy - Annenberg digital news

Anti-American Protests Spread Beyond Middle East

Paige Brettingen |
September 14, 2012 | 10:55 a.m. PDT

Executive Producer

U.S. embassies throughout and beyond the Middle East have become the target of at least 20 protests, stemming from outrage over an American-made film that contained offensive material about the Prophet Muhammad.

At least four people have been killed in Yemen, according to Voice of America, and 224 people have been injured, according to Reuters, in what is the fourth day of protests that first began on the eleventh anniversay of the 9/11 attacks. The violence first began on Tuesday
when U.S. Ambassador, Christopher Stevens, and two other American diplomats were killed after an attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya out of anger of the film. Later reports speculated that Stevens died from asphyxiation from inhaling smoke after a grenade explosion that started a fire.

The New York Times reported that the Pentagon will send 50 Marines to the American consulate in Yemen's capital.

According to The Washington Post, protestors climbed the walls of the U.S. embassies in Tunisia and Sudan, setting fire to cars before being pushed out with tear gas and gunfire by special forces and police.

Police have also resorted to using tear gas in Khartoum, Sudan, at the German and British embassies.

According to The New York Times, Iraqi protestors also called for the removal of U.S. diplomats and demanded the U.S. government to seek out and bring the filmmakers to justice:

  • “We want the U.S. government to prove that there is justice by stopping this movie and punishing the director and his staff,” said Sheik Ahmad al-A’ani, a preacher at a mosque in Baghdad.

Egypt's first freely-elected president, Mohamed Mursi, has also asked President Obama to bring the filmmakers to justice, Reuters reported. Nevertheless, he has also vowed to do what he can to protect the American embassies in Egypt.

President Obama's administration has responded that while they condemn the attacks, they cannot remove citizens' constitutional rights to freedom of speech.

 

See more Neon Tommy coverage on the anti-American protests here.

Reach Executive Paige Brettingen here.



 

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