Overseas Anti-War Protests Turn Ugly

Anti-war protests in the Middle East and Asia turned violent Wednesday.

Angry anti-war demonstrators tried to storm an American fast-food restaurant in northern Lebanon Wednesday, leading to clashes with police that left about 10 people injured.

Thousands of protesters pelted Sydney police with bottles and chairs grabbed from street-side cafes on Wednesday in Australia's most violent demonstration yet against the war in Iraq.

Police in riot gear arrested at least 45 protesters, and one officer was injured when an object hurled from the crowd hit him on the head.

The violence in Lebanon was only the latest to erupt at protests that have become a daily fixture across the Mideast since the U.S.-British attack on Iraq began.

In Beirut, demonstrators carried pictures of American prisoners of war Wednesday, while in the Gulf state of Bahrain, about 400 people held an anti-war sit-in outside the U.S. Embassy.

Up to 4,000 students gathered on the campus of Cairo University, Egypt's oldest public university, but riot police refused to allow them to march to Giza square.

In Iran, hundreds of families of victims of the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war rallied in front of the U.N. office in Tehran Wednesday, state-run Tehran TV reported. The demonstrators denounced the US-British campaign against Iraq and voiced support for the "innocent Iraqi nation."

About 40,000 students marched through the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli peacefully. As the demonstration began to break up hours later, some 200 tried to storm a Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant but were blocked by police. The students threw stones and police opened up with water cannons and fired guns into the air.

Ten people suffered minor injuries in the clashes.

In downtown Beirut, some 5,000 students marched from the United Nations House to the nearby British embassy to shout slogans against the United States, Britain and Israel. A banner had pictures of three American POWs who had been shown on Iraqi television.

Some 2,000 people burned an effigy of President Bush and an Israeli flag in the main square of the southern town of Joub Jannine.

Another anti-war sit-in was held Wednesday in front of the offices of the Red Cross in Damascus, the Syrian capital, by about 30 women.

In Bahrain, the U.S. Embassy closed again Wednesday due to the expected demonstrations, which went off peacefully. The embassy has been open only one day — Tuesday — since the war began.

Bahrain is a close American ally and home to the U.S. 5th Fleet, but anti-war protesters outside the embassy have repeatedly clashed with riot police, thrown stones and ignited gas canisters and tires.

Australia has about 2,000 troops fighting alongside U.S. and British forces in Iraq. About 10,000 demonstrators marched Wednesday in Sydney, mostly college and school students who boycotted classes. They burned American flags, set off firecrackers and chanted "No war!"

The violence broke out after two separate groups of protesters merged outside Sydney's Town Hall and then streamed to Hide Park, where they chanted anti-war slogans and taunted police.

The protesters later headed to Prime Minister John Howard's Sydney office, where they again began hurling bottles at police.

In Melbourne, Australia's second-largest city, more than 1,500 rowdy students marched through the central business district. About 800 students carrying banners rallied in the southern city of Adelaide.

In South Korea, police arrested 30 protesters who scaled a wall at the U.S. Embassy and unfurled a banner reading "Stop the war."

In Seoul, protesters wrapped steel chains around their bodies and chanted "We oppose war! We oppose deployment of troops!" Three protesters, one armed with a toy rifle and wearing a mask of President Bush, climbed a 50-foot-high McDonald's sign and shouted anti-war slogans.

South Korea's government last week submitted a bill to the National Assembly asking for approval to send about 600 military engineers and 100 medical personnel to support the war. Voting was delayed Tuesday amid rising anti-war sentiment.

In Cairo, professors at the university gave short speeches amid banners reading "Jihad (holy war) is the answer" and chanting students who burned several American flags.

"We want Bush to hear our voice," said a 19-year-old student who gave only her first name, Heba, and whose face was covered with a gray veil, called a niqab. "We also ask God to forgive us because we can't do more right know, but God willing, when there's jihad (holy war), we will be able to participate and remain steadfast," she said.

Another, who gave his name only as Mohammed, said "Americans are saying that they are liberating Iraqis from Saddam, but how, by killing them?"