Koran-burning pastor to run for US president

US: An American evangelical pastor whose church's burning of a Koran sparked deadly violence in Afghanistan announced on Thursday that he plans to run for president in 2012.

In a campaign manifesto titled "Stand Up America!" Jones pledged that on entering the White House he would immediately stop government overspending, bring all foreign-based troops home, and deport all illegal immigrants.

The mustachioed pastor also vowed to bring down America's stubbornly high unemployment rate by reducing corporate taxes and cutting bureaucratic red tape to encourage people to start new businesses.

Jones's presidential run is only wishful thinking as he and colleague Wayne Sapp are notorious for their ceremonial "trial and execution" of the Koran in March at their obscure Florida church, the Dove World Outreach Center.

US President Barack Obama was forced to request that he not burn a copy of the Koran on the ninth anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks in 2010, but Jones and Sapp went through with the burning anyway six months later. Angered by their act, demonstrators in the northern Afghan city of Mazar-i-Sharif stormed UN offices on April 1 and killed seven United Nations staff.

More than 20 people were killed in total in a series of protests.

AFP