President Obama warns burning the Koran would endanger troops as Sarah Smith gauges reaction from Muslims while a pastor flies to New York to confront the backer of the planned Islamic centre.
President Barack Obama urged Americans to “hang on to their belief in tolerance” and warned that burning Korans could cause “profound damage”.
“The idea that we would burn the sacred text of someone else’s religion is contrary to what this country stands for,” he said at a White House press conference.
“This is a way of endangering our troops, our sons and daughters.” he said.
“It is in the age of the Internet something that can cause us profound damage around the world, so we’ve got to take it seriously.”
Earlier, Terry Jones told ABC’s ‘Good Morning America’ he planned to cancel ‘international burn a Koran day’ and said he still hoped to meet a Muslim imam about the controversial plans to build a mosque near the site of the 9/11 attacks in New York.
“Right now we have plans not to do it. We believe that the imam is going to keep his word, what he promised us yesterday … We believe that we are, as he said, and promised, going to meet with the Imam in New York tomorrow (Saturday),” Mr Jones said.
How long before someone burns the Bible?"We are the new Communists." That's how one man described to me what its like to be a Muslim in America today, writes US correspondent Sarah Smith from New York.
At morning prayers at the largest mosque in New York City today, there was more of a mood of patient resignation, not the fear or fury you might think that the row over Terry Jones' threatened Koran burning would have created.
One man told me his greatest fear was that if Islam's holy book was publically set on fire, then how long would it be before someone else burnt the Bible?
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However, later it emerged the Imam behind the cultural centre in New York said he had no meeting planned with anyone, including Mr Jones.
That led Mr Jones to issue a new statement in which he said he travel to New York and challenged Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf to meet him.
One man was shot dead after a group of demonstrators attacked a NATO base in Afghanistan’s north to protest over the book-burning.
Thousands of people took to the streets after Eid prayers, with some chanting ‘Death to America’ and throwing stones at the NATO base in Faizabad, injuring three police officers.
Elsewhere, hundreds rallied in Kabul, Badghis, and the western cities of Ghor and Herat.
But Terry Jones later told the US network NBC he took no responsibility for inciting protests or violence.
“We do not feel responsible. We feel we have brought an awareness to radical Islam. We did not pull the trigger,” Mr Jones said.
Mr Jones had agreed to call off the book-burning on Thursday, but later said it was only suspended because he was “lied to” over a deal not to build an Islamic centre near Ground Zero.
Imam Muhammad Musri, the president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, appeared with the pastor at his Gainesville church.
But Mr Musri said the only agreement was for him and Mr Jones to travel to New York to meet the imam overseeing construction plans.
Gainesville residents welcomed the decision to call off the book-burning, criticising Mr Jones for portraying their community as “bigoted and backwards”.
International leaders have condemned plans for Jones’ ‘international burn a Koran day’ which was due to coincide with the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
The president of Indonesia, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, said the burning of the Koran would threaten world peace.
“Burning the holy Quran not only wounds the feelings of the Islamic Ummah but I am also certain the feelings of the followers of other faiths, and indeed can threaten international peace and security,” Mr Yudhoyono said.
As the Florida pastor’s on-off Koran burning threat continued, international broadcasters and news publications were invited to one of the largest mosques in Europe, in south west London to see local religious leaders and Merton councillors make a stand for reason and tolerance; a media stunt of their own, perhaps, in the face of a media stunt by a man with a few dozen followers that has seen the intervention of NATO’s commander in Afghanistan, General Petraeus, and the US President himself.