World protests looming Iraq war

Hundreds of protesters shouting anti-U.S. slogans demonstrated Saturday outside the American Embassy in Moscow against a possible war in Iraq.

The protesters held banners with slogans such as "Iraq isn't your ranch, Mr. Bush" and "U.S.A. is international terrorist No. 1", and shouted "U.S., hands off Iraq!" and "Yankee, Go Home!" Some held portraits of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and sang Soviet-era Communist songs.

"I feel the same way towards Saddam Hussein as his own people feel towards him," said one demonstrator, who gave only his first name, Pavel. "If his own people love and support him, no one must tell them otherwise."

The protest, organized by the Moscow branch of the Russian Communist Party, was joined by Iraqis and citizens of other Arab countries, who waved Iraqi flags and carried portraits of Saddam. In the city of Yekaterinburg in the Ural Mountains, about 80 people protested outside the U.S. Consulate, Interfax news agency reported.

Also on Saturday, hundreds of anti-war demonstrators marched through the streets of several Pakistani cities urging the United States and its allies to find a peaceful solution to the crisis in Iraq.

About 200 people -- a mix of young students and human rights activists -- marched in the eastern city of Lahore, while 150 gathered in the southern city of Karachi to express concern over the increasing danger of a U.S.-led attack on Iraq.

"Don't impose war on Iraq," said Farrukh Sohail Goindi, the organizer of the anti-war rally, while addressing protesters in Lahore.

The demonstrators, who waved banners carrying anti-war slogans, wanted to march on the U.S. Consulate, but police stopped them.

About six activists were later allowed to go to the consulate to hand American officials a resolution calling on Washington not to attack Iraq.

At a peace march near Islamabad, hundreds of children, women and men formed a human chain and chanted slogans against an attack on Iraq.

They held banners that read: "No blood for Oil" and "U.N.: Stop America from attacking Iraq".

The United States and Britain have sent troops and ships to the Persian Gulf in case of war, while U.N. inspectors continue look for banned weapons in Iraq. --Agencies