1 of 6. An Afghan National Army soldier is reflected in a window as he patrols near Camp Phoenix, after an attack in Kabul April 2, 2011. 
 
 KANDAHAR, Afghanistan (Reuters) - At least 10 people have been killed and 83 wounded in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar, officials said on Saturday, on a second day of violent protests over the burning of a Koran by a radical fundamentalist Christian in the United States. 
 
 A suicide attack also hit a NATO military base in the capital Kabul, the day after protesters over-ran a U.N. mission in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif and killed seven foreign staff, in the deadliest attack on the UN in Afghanistan. 
 
 Some protesters in Kandahar carried white Taliban flags and shouted slogans including "long live the Taliban" and "death to America." In rioting that lasted hours, they smashed shops, burned tires and vandalized a girl's high school. 
 
 Two of the dead were Afghan policemen, an official said. 
 
 The violence is the worst in Afghanistan for months, and comes as the country gears up for the first stage of a years-long security handover to Afghan troops, and after the commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, General David Petraeus, delivered an optimistic assessment of progress in the war. 
 
 The attacks were driven by anger at the actions of extremist Christian preacher Terry Jones who supervised the burning of the Koran in front of about 50 people at a church in Florida on March 20, according to his website. 
 
 The burning initially passed relatively unnoticed in Afghanistan, but after criticism from President Hamid Karzai, and calls for justice during Friday sermons, thousands poured into the streets in several cities to denounce Jones this weekend. 
 
 Afghan and U.N. officials suggested provocateurs had sabotaged peaceful protests. Marches in Kabul, western Herat city and northern Tahar province ended without violence. 
 
 But the Taliban denied any role in the Mazar attack or Kandahar protests and analysts warned against underestimating the depth of anti-Western sentiment in much of Afghanistan, after years of military presence and many civilian casualties. 
 
 "Insurgent provocation is not necessary for things like (the U.N. attack) to happen, because indeed the mood and atmosphere in a large part of the population is like this," said Thomas Ruttig, co-director of the Afghanistan Analysts Network. 
 
 "Anger over foreigners in general, which has probably spread from the military to NGOs and the U.N. and other actors, just needs a little spark and things can be set alight." 
 
 In Kabul on Saturday, a small group of burkha-clad insurgents attacked a coalition base, although they caused only light injuries to three soldiers, police and NATO said. 
 
 SOME SHOT, SOME BEATEN 
 
 In Kandahar, one of the policemen killed and several civilians died from gunshot wounds, said Abdul Qayum Pukhla, the senior health official for the province. The rest of the dead had been beaten and stoned he added. 
 
 It was not clear if gunshot wounds were caused by protesters or police trying to control them over hours of rioting. 
 
 A band of around 150 men who had taken to the streets to denounce the Koran burning set tires alight, smashed shops and assaulted an Afghan photographer, Reuters' witnesses said. Some of the attackers were carrying guns. 
 
 The photographer was hit over the head and had his camera taken from him and smashed, by protesters who discussed killing him. Police kept other journalists from approaching the crowd. 
 
 In the violence they also smashed windows and burned chairs at the Zarghona High School for girls. The Taliban opposed girls' education, and Kandahar was their spiritual heartland. 
 
 The spokesman for the governor of Kandahar province said the protest was organized by the Taliban who used the Koran burning as an excuse to incite violence in a city where their reach has been curtailed by an aggressive NATO-led military campaign. 
 
 INSURGENTS OR PROTESTERS? 
 
 The Taliban said they had no role in the Kandahar violence or Friday's assault on the U.N. office in the usually peaceful city of Mazar-i-Sharif, after both provincial governors and a senior U.N. official suggested an insurgent role. 
 
 "The Taliban had nothing to do with this, it was a pure act of responsible Muslims," spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said by phone from an undisclosed location of the Mazar attack. He later added that the Kandahar demonstration was also spontaneous. 
 
 Interior Ministry spokesman Zemari Bashery said police reports suggested the attack was not planned. 
 
 Around 5,000 demonstrators flooded into the streets of a city considered safe enough to be in the vanguard of a crucial security transition, after Friday prayers ended, and many headed straight for the U.N. mission. 
 
 There they overwhelmed security guards, burned parts of the compound and climbed blast walls to topple a guard tower. The throat of one of slain foreigners had been slit, the U.N. said. 
 
 Five Afghan protesters were also killed and others wounded, some after trying to take weapons off U.N. security guards. 
 
 The attack took many in the city, one of the country's most prosperous and stable, by surprise. Some were horrified by the extreme violence but not all had sympathy for the foreign dead. 
 
 "I took part in the demonstration to curse the foreigners but I had no weapon," said shopkeeper Rahim Mohammad. 
 
 "But I don't feel sorry for UN workers killed, our people are slaughtered by foreigners everyday." 
 
 More volatile protests are possible across deeply religious Afghanistan, where anti-Western sentiment has been fueled for years by civilian casualties, and the Taliban. 
 
 (Additional reporting by Hamid Shalizi in KABUL and Ismail Sameem in KANDAHAR, writing by Emma Graham-Harrison; Editing by Jeremy Laurence) ||||| Check out CNN.com's Afghanistan Crossroads blog for the latest developments, and the Belief Blog for a timeline of Terry Jones. 
 
 Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- The deadly protests in northern Afghanistan over a Quran burning spread to the country's war-torn southern region on Saturday, with provincial government officials reporting at least nine civilians dead and dozens injured. 
 
 The violence struck the city of Kandahar when demonstrators took to the streets to protest the torching of Islam's most sacred book by a U.S. church. 
 
 The unrest followed a demonstration on Friday in the northern town of Mazar-e Sharif, in which five demonstrators and seven U.N. employees were killed when an angry throng stormed the U.N. compound there. 
 
 U.S. President Barack Obama on Saturday extended condolences to the families and loved ones of those killed in Mazar-e Sharif, but also decried the burning of the Quran. 
 
 "The desecration of any holy text ... is an act of extreme intolerance and bigotry," he said in a statement released by the White House. "However, to attack and kill innocent people in response is outrageous, and an affront to human decency and dignity." 
 
 Besmellah Afghanmal, a Kandahar provincial council member, said hundreds gathered in Kandahar city to protest the Quran burning. 
 
 "Today the enemies of peace in Afghanistan killed and injured our people in Kandahar," said a statement from the office of the Kandahar governor. 
 
 The demonstration started peacefully, but protesters turned violent, setting fire to a school and vehicles in Kandahar city, said Zalmai Ayoubi, spokesman for the governor of Kandahar province. 
 
 Along with the nine deaths, 73 others were injured, the provincial government said. 
 
 Ayoubi said Afghan security forces arrested 17 people, including seven who were armed and are suspected of shooting at protesters. 
 
 Pastor Terry Jones sparked international controversy last year when his Gainesville, Florida, church planned "International Burn a Quran Day" on the ninth anniversary of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. 
 
 Jones' church did not host a Quran burning on that day, but the Dove World Outreach Center's website announced an "International Judge the Koran Day" set for last month. 
 
 Another post on the site's blog showed an image of a burning book and read, "The event is over, the Koran was found guilty and a copy was burned inside the building." 
 
 Some witnesses in Kandahar said protesters were shot by police. 
 
 "I saw personally three people who (were) shot to death, and one of them was shot just next to me," protester Shah Meer said. 
 
 But police said they neither shot at nor killed anyone. 
 
 "There (was) gunfire into the air in order to bring the people under control, and luckily not one has been killed as a result of the gunfire," said Zemarai Bashari, spokesman for the interior ministry. 
 
 Meanwhile, a spokesman for the Taliban said the group was not behind any deaths during the event. 
 
 "What happened in Kandahar today was the feeling of the nation, and the Islamic movement of the Taliban was not involved in any (violence)," Zabiullah Mojahed said. "It was the Afghan police that killed the innocent people of Kandahar while they were expressing their feeling against the burning of holy Quran in Florida." 
 
 The Mazar-e Sharif killings generated worldwide condemnation, from the U.N. Security Council to the Organization of the Islamic Conference, a 57-state group that calls itself the "collective voice of the Muslim world." 
 
 Jones in a statement Friday called the assault "a very tragic and criminal action." 
 
 Lal Mohammad Ahmadzai, a spokesman for the police in Mazar-e Sharif, told reporters that a number of suspects "who might be the main organizers" had been arrested from the Friday attack 
 
 The United Nations says the seven U.N. staffers killed were four Nepalese security guards and three civilians. A U.N. source said the three civilians were from Norway, Sweden and Romania. 
 
 U.N. Peacekeeping Director Alain Le Roy said five demonstrators also were killed. He said no Afghan U.N. staff members were among the dead, he said. 
 
 "I understand there were hundreds, if not thousands, of demonstrators. Some of them were clearly armed and they stormed into the building," Le Roy said. 
 
 He said the security guards tried their best to halt the demonstrators' advance, but were overwhelmed. 
 
 Le Roy said it was not clear that the United Nations was the target. "It happened to be the U.N. because the U.N. is on the ground." 
 
 Another 24 people were wounded, said Abdul Rauof Taj, security director of Balkh province. 
 
 The U.N. Security Council met Friday and issued a statement condemning the attack, which occurred at the operations center of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, or UNAMA. 
 
 Haji Sakhi Mohammad, a businessman in Mazar-e Sharif, said the incident began after Friday prayers, when many people joined a protest against the burning of the Quran. People calling "Death to America" marched to the U.N. compound and broke in, he said. Gunfire broke out, and "I saw protesters shot to death," he said 
 
 A student in Mazar-e-Sharif said he and his friends joined the protesters, who numbered in the hundreds. "When we reached the UNAMA office, we came under gunfire by Afghan security guards. Protesters became angry and stormed the building." 
 
 Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the Quran burning during a speech before Pakistan's legislature on March 22. 
 
 "May I, at the outset, strongly condemn on behalf of the people of Pakistan and on my own behalf the deliberate desecration of the holy Quran by a fanatic in Florida," he said, according to a transcript of speech. "We condemn this act in the strongest possible words. ... It is a serious setback to the efforts at promoting harmony among civilized communities throughout the world." 
 
 CNN's Matiullah Mati and Catherine E. Shoichet contributed to this report ||||| Eight people killed in Kandahar as thousands protest against a US pastor's burning of the Quran last month. 
 
 Eight people have been killed in Afghanistan as protests continue against the burning of the Quran by a controversial US pastor. Thousands of people took to the streets in Kandahar city on Saturday, a day after a deadly attack on UN staff. Protesters attacked the police and set shops ablaze. About 70 people were injured. Abdul Qayoum Pukhla, a senior doctor at Kandahar's Mirwais hospital, said victims suffering from bullet injuries and wounds caused by rocks had been admitted to the hospital. The spokesman for the governor of Kandahar province said the protest was organised by the Taliban who used the Quran burning in Florida as an excuse to incite violence. "The demonstration in Kandahar was planned by insurgents to take advantage of the situation and to create insecurity," Zalmay Ayoubi said. UN office attacked A day earlier, after Friday prayers ended, protesters overwhelmed security guards at the UN office in the usually peaceful northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif. They burned parts of the compound and climbed blast walls to topple a guard tower. Afghan officials said at least 11 people were killed, including seven UN staff. The throat of one of the dead foreigners was slit, the UN said. Demonstrators had gathered to protest over reports that an evangelical pastor last month burned a copy of the Muslim holy book in the US. 
 
 The pastor's "Judge the Quran day" drew widespread international condemnation The Taliban said they had no role in Friday's assault on the UN office, after both the provincial governor and a senior UN official suggested provocateurs among the crowd had sparked or led the vicious attack. "The Taliban had nothing to do with this, it was a pure act of responsible Muslims," spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told the Reuters news agency. "The foreigners brought the wrath of the Afghans on themselves by burning the Quran." President Karzai spoke with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Saturday morning to convey his grief over the attack on the UN. Karzai described the attack as "ruthless" and affirmed that the government of Afghanistan is committed to launching an all-out probe into the incident and bringing to justice those responsible. Stressing the importance of promoting a peaceful co-existence and harmony among the religions, Karzai asked Ban to play his role in raising public awareness on the significance of resorting to non-violence and non-desecration of faith and dialogue among religions. Kabul attack Also on Saturday, fighters clad in burkas attacked a coalition base in Kabul with guns and rocket-propelled grenades, but were killed either when they detonated their explosives or by Afghan or coalition fire outside the entrance, NATO and police said. Al Jazeera's Hashem Ahelbarra, reporting from Kabul, said the Taliban had claimed responsibility for that attack. "They're saying the Americans, the Europeans and the United Nations have to take a very tough stance when it comes to the desecration of Islamic symbols and they haven't seen that, they haven't seen any statement issued by the UN or the American forces in Afghanistan," he said. "This is why they're trying to converge in the main cities, in particular in areas where there are military bases and UN offices, to send a very strong signal that they are really angry about what's going on." Terry Jones, an American pastor, created a storm of controversy after he announced that he would burn copies of the Quran on the anniversary of the September 11 attacks last year. Under pressure from political leaders, Jones "suspended" the event. However, on March 20, Jones oversaw the burning of a copy of the Muslim holy book by another pastor, Wayne Sapp. Many Afghans only found out about it when Karzai condemned the desecration four days later. Sapp called the deaths in Mazar-i-Sharif "tragic," but said he did not regret the actions of his church. "I in no way feel like our church is responsible for what happened," he said. Protests also broke out on Friday in Kabul and Herat in western Afghanistan.
– Pastor Terry Jones' Koran-burning stunt continues to reverberate across the world. At least eight people were killed in a riot in Kandahar today while protesting Jones' actions last month, reports al-Jazeera and CNN. The unrest follows the death of a dozen people yesterday, including seven UN workers, during a riot in the normally peaceful northern town of Mazar-e Sharif. Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Kandahar, clashed with police, and set fire to shops. About 70 were injured. Afghan officials say the Taliban infiltrated otherwise peaceful protests in both cities to incite violence, but the group denies it, notes Reuters. "The Taliban had nothing to do with this, it was a pure act of responsible Muslims," said a spokesman. "The foreigners brought the wrath of the Afghans on themselves by burning the Koran."