Seven US military trainers were wounded on Sunday when a grenade was thrown at their base in northern Afghanistan, police said, as anti-Western fury deepened over the burning of the Holy Quran at a Nato base.
Despite an apology from US President Barack Obama, riots raged across the country for a sixth day on Sunday against the desecration of the holy book at a Nato air base at Bagram. Some protesters hoisted the white Taliban flag. The Afghan Interior Ministry identified one of its employees as a suspect in the fatal shooting of two US officers in its headquarters a day earlier, an attack that prompted Nato to recall its staff from ministries.
One civilian was killed, 15 more were wounded and three policemen injured in riots near the Nato base in northern Kunduz province, where the blast that wounded the Americans took place, regional police chief Samihullah Qatra told reporters.
Nato confirmed there had been an explosion outside one of its bases in northern Afghanistan, but declined to comment on casualties.
The protests have killed 30 people and wounded 200, including two other US troops who were shot dead by an Afghan soldier who joined rallies in the country's east.
The Holy Quran burnings could make it far harder for Nato forces to win the trust of the Afghan public as they try to stabilise the country ahead of the withdrawal of foreign combat troops at the end of 2014.
Afghan security sources identified Abdul Saboor, a 25-year-old police intelligence officer, as a suspect in the shooting of the Americans at close range inside the Interior Ministry.
In a statement to media, the ministry said: "An employee has been identified as a suspect and he has now fled. The Interior Ministry is trying to arrest the suspected individual."
Nato is supposed to be moving away from a combat role to an advise-and-assist mission as early as next year. That will require Nato to place more staff in Kabul's ministries.
CCTV footage showed that Saboor had access to the Command and Control Centre, tucked deep inside the ministry, where the slain Americans were found, security officials told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
The Taliban took responsibility for the attack, saying it was in retaliation for the burning of the Holy Qurans.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai repeated his plea for calm and restraint. "It is time to regain and preserve our calm, and not allow our enemies to misuse it," he told reporters, referring to the nation-wide violence.
Meanwhile, the United States should resist the urge to pull troops out of Afghanistan ahead of schedule due to the violence against Americans over the burning of the holy Quran at a US military base, US Ambassador to Afghanistan Ryan Crocker said on Sunday.
"Tensions are running very high here. I think we need to let things calm down, return to a more normal atmosphere, and then get on with business," Crocker said in an interview from Kabul on CNN's "State of the Union."
He added that a full investigation of the incident was underway at the Bagram airbase near Kabul.
"This is not the time to decide that we are done here. We have got to redouble our efforts. We've got to create a situation that al Qaeda is not coming back," Crocker said.
"If we decide we're tired of it, al Qaeda and the Taliban certainly aren't," he said.
US forces are scheduled to cede the lead role in combat operations in Afghanistan next year, but will keep fighting alongside Afghan troops under American plans announced recently.
Crocker added that Karzai accepts both publicly and privately that the burning was inadvertent.
Still, anger raged in Afghanistan for a sixth day on Sunday over desecration of the Muslim holy book.
In a CNN interview from Rabat, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Sunday others need to join Karzai in calling for an end to the violence. "It is out of hand and it needs to stop."
Clinton chided Republican US presidential candidates for continuing criticism of Obama's apology. "I find it somewhat troubling that our politics would enflame such a dangerous situation in Afghanistan," she said.
"It was the right thing to do to have our president on record as saying this was not intentional, we deeply regret it," Clinton said.
A leading contender for the Republican presidential nomination, former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, on Sunday stepped up his criticism of Obama. Speaking on "Fox News Sunday," Romney said that for many Americans, considering the thousands of American deaths in Afghanistan, the apology "sticks in their throats."
Pulling US forces and civilians out of Afghan ministry offices after two US officers were killed in the Interior Ministry in apparent retaliation for the Koran incident was, Romney said, "an extraordinary admission of a failure."