Afghan ministers cancel Washington trip amid Quran protests

Afghanistan’s defense and interior ministers canceled a trip this week to meet with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta in order to deal with the violence in Afghanistan, Pentagon press secretary George Little said Sunday.

The two ministers and other senior Afghan officials were scheduled to meet with Panetta on Thursday, but a wave of violent protests in the wake of the Quran burnings at a U.S. airbase have caused the trip to be put off.

Little said the officials are consulting this week with Afghan government and religious leaders about “how to protect International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) personnel and quell violence in the country.”

“The secretary understands why that's a priority and why they are unable to travel to Washington in the coming days,” Little said in an email to reporters. “He looks forward to hosting them at the Pentagon in the near future.”

Four U.S. soldiers were killed in Afghanistan in the past week, including two U.S. officers stationed in the Interior Ministry on Saturday. That prompted NATO to withdraw its officials from all Afghan ministries.

Widespread protests have continued over the past week since last Tuesday’s burning of Qurans at Bagram Airbase. Seven U.S. soldiers were wounded Sunday by a grenade thrown into a base in northern Afghanistan, and a Taliban suicide bomber killed at least nine people at an eastern Afghanistan airport Monday in what the group said was revenge for the Quran burnings, the BBC reported.

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