Egypt's Mubarak Warns '100 Bin Ladens'

Egypt's president said he could not stop U.S.-led warships from crossing the Suez Canal toward Iraq, and warned a drawn out war would lead to increased Islamic militancy throughout the world.

"If there is one (Osama) bin Laden now, there will be 100 bin Ladens afterward," Hosni Mubarak said in reference to the al Qaeda terror network leader during a speech to army commanders in the city of Suez, some 80 miles east of the capital, Cairo.

Mubarak also warned that the war would have "catastrophic" effects on global economic, political and humanitarian conditions and that all Mideast states, including Israel, should be free of weapons of mass destruction.

The president's speech seemed aimed at quelling criticism at home of Egypt allowing U.S. and British ships to sail through the strategic Suez Canal toward Iraq.

Egypt could only close the 101-mile waterway when it is at war and to ships from belligerent nations, the president said in his speech, which was broadcast live on Egyptian TV and monitored by The Associated Press.

"Crossing of ships of the Suez Canal is a right for all countries and is an international commitment that cannot be trampled with," Mubarak said.

Since the war began, thousands of protesters have protested across Egypt and urged Mubarak to close the canal to coalition warships.

Three U.S. warships crossed the canal into the Red Sea on Sunday.

Protesters have also accused Mubarak of doing too little to stop the war and criticized his close relationship with America.

Mubarak has condemned the war, but blamed it on what he calls Iraqi counterpart Saddam Hussein's failure to cooperate with the international community.

Egyptian officials said that some 64 anti-war protesters, including two lawmakers, detained over allegedly inciting anti-war protesters to destroy property and attack police officers have been ordered released.

Nasserite Party MP Hamdeen Sabahi, 50, and independent politician Mohammed Farid Hassanein, 55, were freed Sunday. They were among scores of people detained in two consecutive days of clashes between protesters and police in Cairo after the war began.

Prosecution officials said the lawmakers were among 30 detainees bailed Sunday.

Another 34 protesters were ordered released last week.

Five protesters remained in custody Sunday, a lawyer from the Cairo-based Hisham Mubarak Legal Center, Ahmed Seif, told the AP.

In Jordan, some 100 local identities, including former prime ministers and writers, delivered a petition to King Abdullah II urging him to condemn the war against Iraq.

"We want to make sure that Jordan is not used in anyway as a venue to assist American aggression on Iraq," said Jordanian political analyst Labib Kamhawi, who signed the petition.

The Muslim Brotherhood issued a statement Monday calling on the government to throw out the hundreds of U.S. troops that are manning anti-missile batteries along Jordan's border with Iraq.

The brotherhood, the most popular Islamic group in Jordan, also urged people "to boycott American and British tourists and to abstain from providing them with any kind of service as a protest against the aggression on Iraq."

Most Jordanians oppose the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and the government has striven to distance itself from the war.

In Cyprus, police arrested a man Monday for throwing a petrol bomb at the U.S. Embassy here before dawn. The bomb hit the wall of the garden surrounding the embassy, but caused no damage, Greek Cypriot police said in a statement.

No details were available on the man's identity or motives, but Greek Cypriots have been demonstrating daily against the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, with many protests being staged outside the embassy.

In Syria, 400 women chanted anti-U.S. slogans following U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell's warning to Syria to cease its support for terrorism.

The women, most wearing veils, waved Syrian, Iraqi and Palestinian flags during the march near a district in Damascus housing several Arab embassies. More than 100 baton-wielding riot police ringed the area.

"Bush, Blair, go away," one banner read. "No to American terrorism," read another.

In a speech Sunday to a pro-Israel lobby group in Washington, Powell demanded Syria stop supporting terrorism.

His comments following Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's recent claims that Syria is providing war supplies to Iraq.

Syria, which strongly opposes the U.S.-led invasion of neighboring Iraq, has rejected America's charges as Washington's bid to cover up its battlefield failures.

In Lebanon, protests against the war took a spiritual turn with about 300 students saying a Muslim prayer outside the British Embassy and some 100 employees of the United Nations holding a candlelight vigil in the garden of U.N. House in Beirut.

The students, who held banners bearing anti-war slogans, dispersed peacefully under the eye of Lebanese security forces.

The U.N. personnel issued a statement saying they were "extremely worried" about the war's impact on millions of Iraqis.