US to mark 9/11 amid Islam tensions

Remembrance ceremonies, marred by global tensions over a Florida pastor's threat to burn the Koran, will take place in New York and at the Pentagon on the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, reports ABC News.

The rituals honouring the nearly 3,000 people killed on September 11, 2001, when Islamist terrorists flew hijacked planes into the defence headquarters and New York's World Trade Centre towers, unfold almost unchanged each year.

In New York at Ground Zero the names of the 2,752 victims who died there are read out against a background of sombre music, with moments of silence marking the times when the two airliners slammed into the Twin Towers - and again when the towers collapsed.

President Barack Obama will attend the memorial service at the Pentagon, while vice-president Joseph Biden will be in New York.

A third service will taking place in Shanksville, Pennsylvania where the fourth hijacked airliner crashed into a field.

This year the dignified and simple events are overshadowed by a row over a renegade Florida pastor's threat to publicly burn hundreds of Korans on Saturday if plans are not dropped for a proposed mosque near Ground Zero.

The pastor, Terry Jones, seemed to have abandoned his Koran-burning plan by Friday after pleas from Mr Obama, the Vatican and several other world leaders warning of a catastrophe for Western-Muslim relations.

However, tensions remained high and Pastor Jones's stunt ensured that the related controversy over the proposed Ground Zero mosque took centre stage.

Rival rallies by groups supporting and opposing the disputed mosque project were to take place nearby soon after the official ceremonies at Ground Zero, breaking an unwritten taboo on open politicisation of the anniversary. Police said they would ensure the two groups were kept apart.