Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi has criticised the alleged desecration of the Quran by US soldiers at Guantanamo Bay, the official Bernama news agency said.

"We are saddened by the incident as it has humiliated Muslims," he said.

"If we were not weak, (if we were) progressive and strong, nobody could harm us," said Abdullah, who is currently Organisation of Islamic Conference chairperson.

Fourteen people have been killed and 120 wounded in three days of violent demonstrations in Afghanistan, in which security forces and police have clashed with crowds following unrest sparked by the alleged desecration.

The protests were sparked by a report in Newsweek magazine last week that interrogators at the US military detention center in Guantanamo Bay desecrated copies of the Quran by leaving them in toilet cubicles and even stuffing one down a lavatory to rattle Muslim prisoners.

Newsweek apology

However yesterday Newsweek apologised for the report, stating that it had inaccurately reported that US military investigators had flushed the Muslim holy book down the toilet.

According to a Reuters report, the weekly news magazine said that the information had come from a "knowledgeable government source" who told Newsweek that a military report on abuse at Guantanamo Bay said interrogators flushed at least one copy of the Quran down a toilet in a bid to make detainees talk.

But Newsweek said the source later told the magazine he could not be certain he had seen an account of the Quran incident in the military report and that it might have been in other investigative documents or drafts.