Afghan tribal elders from Kandahar, where an American soldier shot dead 16 villagers, called for calm on Monday as extra security forces deployed to guard against anti-US protests.
Community leaders in Panjwayi district, where the heavily armed soldier burst into three homes on a killing spree as families slept early Sunday, were keen to discourage an anti-American backlash, one representative told AFP.
"The people have told us 'we won't resort to violence, we won't demonstrate, but we want our government to deliver justice and bring the person responsible to justice'," the member of the Kandahar provincial council told AFP.
"We have promised them, the government has promised them that they will pursue this at high levels," added Haji Agha Lalai, who hosted a large gathering of tribal elders from Panjwayi district in his Kandahar home.
The funerals were held on Sunday and there was a huge outpouring of grief. "Nobody is talking of violence and protests there," Lalai told AFP.
Nevertheless, Afghan authorities deployed extra police and soldiers to prevent any outbreak of violent demonstrations in Kandahar, the provincial capital just to the east of Panjwayi, an AFP reporter said.
"We will not demonstrate. This requires a political solution, it needs to be solved by the government. If we demonstrate, others will misuse this and turn it into violence," said Kandahar resident Bakhtyar, who goes by one name.
"This time an American killed Afghans. We Afghans, too, have killed Americans in the past," he added.
The Taliban wasted no time in trying to capitalise on the killings, sending fighters to mosques in Panjwayi as the funerals of the victims of the shootings took place, urging villagers to rise up.
"They were telling the people: 'The invading infidel Americans come to your homes, insult your women and kill your children. What are you waiting for? You should come out and demonstrate'," local resident Abdul Khaliq told AFP.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/afghan-tribal-elders-call-calm-massacre-174019442.html
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