Informed eyewitnesses at the scene told Iran Press Service that the demonstrations were organised by members of the Badr Brigade, the military wing of the Tehran-backed Supreme Assembly for the Islamic Revolution of Iraq (SAIRI) and Iranian agents of the "Iraq Unit" trained specially for urban guerrilla, psychological warfare and trouble-making, within Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.

Iran has sent back to Iraq most of the Badr’s members, estimated at between 15.000 to 30.000, trained and armed by the ruling Iranian ayatollahs, plus "hundreds" of the "Iraq Unit" agents.

A token of U.S. forces present watched the rally, organised on the occasion of the birth of Mohammad, Muslim’s prophet, but let it go on.

The American news agency Associated Press said up to 10,000 people, mainly Shi'ite Muslims, discontent with Iraq's Western administration and unsatisfied with the speed at which power is being handed back to Iraqis, rallied in front of a Sunni Muslim mosque in the northern district of Azimiyah, then marched to the nearby Kazemiya quarter, home to one of the holiest Shiite shrines in Iraq, with some carrying portraits of the late Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini of Iran and other noted Shi’ite clerics like the late Ayatollah Mohammad Baqer al-Sadr, who was assassinated on the order of the toppled Saddam Hoseyn.

"The demonstration was well organised", one eyewitness said, adding that the organisers sprayed participants with water to cool them off, and monitors followed the crowd to ensure that no violence occurred.

"We decided to gather outside a Sunni mosque to show unity between Shi’ites and Sunnis", said Rashid Hamdan, an organiser, who added that the procession was organised by religious groups from Baghdad's Sadr City, formerly known as Saddam City, where an estimated 2 million Shiites live.

"What we are calling for is an interim government that represents all segments of Iraqi society", said Ali Salman, an activist.

The crowd chanted "No Shi’ites and no Sunnis, just Islamic unity" and carried banners reading "No to the foreign administration" and "We want honest Iraqis, not their thieves". "We will not sell this country," they chanted, in an obvious reference to Ahmad Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National Congress and one of the key players in current round of U.S.-led discussions to form a new government.

Mr. Chalabi was convicted in 1992 by a Jordanian court on embezzlement and fraud, and some Iraqis have criticised him harshly.

Chalabi, a secular Shi’a, says he was set up.

U.S. administrator Paul Bremer has insisted he is pushing ahead with the creation of an Iraqi interim authority, but Iraqi groups have accused Washington of backing away from its promises to hand real power to Iraqis.

But senior Iraqi political figures who have returned from exile have expressed deep suspicion of the term "interim authority" rather than a more powerful "interim government" to pave the way for elections and say that an "authority" was unlikely to grant Iraqis full control over sensitive ministries and foreign policy.

Bremer said during a visit to the northern city of Mosul on Sunday he would hold more talks with Iraqi political leaders later this month on the establishment of authority and dismissed U.S. media reports that the process had been delayed.

As anti-American protester were marching in the streets, the 24 hour, Arabic-language "al-Alam" television, which is run by the Iranian conservatives-controlled Radio and Television with the help of SAIRI, was broadcasting an address of Iran’s leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i, calling for unity between all Muslim standing "American hegemony".

"Under the slogan of democracy and freedom, the United States supports the crimes of the Zionist (Israel) regime in Palestine or deprives the Iraqi people from their most basic rights", he pointed out, addressing senior Iranian officials and ambassadors from Muslim nations on the occasion of the birth of Mohammad.

In an obvious, but clear reference to top Iraqi clerics like Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, who advocate the separation of religion from politics, Mr. Khameneh’i said "Muslim must learn from the late emam Khomeini who drew distinction between true Mohammadan Islam with American Islam, one that is tailor-made for American and Western principles, a reactionary Islam full of superstition that is opposed to a real Islam that calls for unity and standing up to the oppressors like America".