LONDON, May 16 (AFP) - Deadly protests in Afghanistan against the reported desecration of the Koran by US officials were the work of extremists opposed to the country's reconstruction, Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said Monday.

But Abdullah stressed that the violence did not mean that US and Western forces, deployed in the country since the US-led war that ousted the Taliban regime in 2001, were not welcome in his country.

Abdullah, speaking alongside British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, added that despite the unrest, in which at least 14 people were killed, Afghans wanted the world community to continue helping rebuilding his war-scarred nation.

Clashes last week between angry mobs and police in 12 Afghan provinces, which also left at least 120 wounded, were sparked by a Newsweek magazine report that US interrogators at the Guantanamo Bay detention center in Cuba had defiled copies of the Koran by leaving them in toilet cubicles and flushing one down a toilet.

Abdullah and Straw noted that Newsweek had apologized for the report. The newsmagazine, while acknowledging parts of its report could be wrong, has not issued a retraction.

Abdullah labelled the riots in Afghanistan "very unfortunate, very tragic" and said they showed that both the authorities in Kabul and international powers "need to work on all aspects of the process a long, long time together." "How (the violence) was made into that scale in Afghanistan, we have to look at," he said.

"Certainly the elements that don't want the process to succeed in Afghanistan have been able to capitalize on that in creating this situation with the violence that we're all witness to", he said, also referring to the perpetrators as "extremist elements and those who don't want the (reconstruction) process as a whole".

Were the desecration of the Koran true, Abdullah said, it would "create big, big resentments in the Muslim population as a whole." Nevertheless, "the people of Afghanistan would like to see the continuation of the support of the international community," he told journalists. "What we seek is... continuing long-term support."

"We all agree that without the continuation of support from the international community, which comes in different terms -- military security, reconstruction assistance, humanitarian assistance, political support and so on -- the process has not consolidated enough that Afghanistan will be able to stand on its own feet. On that point we all agree."

Straw praised Afghanistan's "great achievements" in recent years, noting last year's presidential elections, education and health care development and the formation of a national police and army. "Progress that has been made is visible and palpable", he said, referring to his last visit in February.

British Development Secretary Hilary Benn will host an Afghanistan donors conference in London on June 21. Straw said Abdullah would attend that conference, as well as a meeting of G8 foreign ministers being held on June 23.