Bagram- A crowd of Afghans protesting outside the main U.S. military base in Afghanistan swelled to more than 2,000 on Tuesday over a report that foreign troops had improperly disposed of copies of the Koran, Afghan officials said.

Earlier, General John Allen, commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), offered his "sincere apologies" for the actions in an apparent bid to prevent anti-Western anger from spreading across Afghanistan.