Mourner Killed at Funeral for Youth Slain in Jordan Protests

Mourners rioted Thursday at the funeral of a boy killed during protests against government price increases, and one man died when authorities opened fire, residents said. Another report said a policeman also was slain.

Mourners pelted police with stones and burned several buildings, including the house of a local official accused by Mazar residents of killing the boy, witnesses said.

Violent demonstrations were reported Thursday in several other villages in southern Jordan. The latest killing raised the death toll to at least eight in three days of unrest.

Despite the widespread protests against Jordanian Prime Minister Zaid Rifai’s austerity measures, there was no evidence of opposition to King Hussein himself in the southern Jordan region that is considered a bedrock of his strength.

Slain by Police

Several residents of this village 55 miles south of Amman said members of Jordan’s Bedouin desert police shot and killed Yacoub Katawneh, 23, during the chaotic funeral for his cousin, 13-year-old Ibrahim Katawneh.

“We had two burials. It was an awful scene. People shouted and threw stones at police. Armed desert police shot live ammunition at people,” said one resident, who would not give his name.

Officials in the nearby city of Kerak confirmed the two deaths.

The officials, and several witnesses in the town, said a local official allegedly killed the younger Katawneh and injured six other people when he fired at a crowd of demonstrators who approached his house Wednesday.

One official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said one policeman died and another was injured in the Mazar rioting on Thursday. Police did not confirm the report.

Residents said rioters Thursday burned an army supply depot, a bank, a court building and the home of the official accused of Wednesday’s shootings.

Twenty anti-riot vehicles stood at the entrance of the village on the historic King’s Highway, blocking the village to outsiders.

The unrest began Tuesday in Maan, 120 miles south of the capital, when taxi drivers demonstrated against price rises in gasoline and vehicle fees imposed Sunday as part of an agreement Jordan made with the International Monetary Fund as a prerequisite to rescheduling the country’s $6-billion debt.

The declining value of the dinar during the past year has led many prices to double while incomes have remained stable.