In pictures: Baghdad protests

Thousands of people have protested in Baghdad against a proposal to allow the US military presence in Iraq to continue.

Organisers said the demonstration, which began with joint Sunni and Shia prayers, would remain peaceful.

But security was stepped up in the surrounding areas, with Iraqi police blocking roads and searching people entering the square where the protesters were gathering.

People shouted anti-American slogans and waved Iraqi flags, and an effigy of US President George Bush was burnt.

The protest was called by leading Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr - in an address read to the crowd he said the US was "no use" to Iraqis.

Sadr fiercely opposes the agreement allowing US troops to stay in Iraq until 2011, which will be voted on in parliament next week.

A spokesman for Sadr said the protests were for people to "express rejection of the pact and the occupation".

Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has said the proposal will pave the way for the restoration of full Iraqi sovereignty in three years' time.

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