Protests by frustrated jobless Iraqis in two cities turned violent this morning as demonstrators threw rocks and set cars ablaze while local security forces responded with gunfire.
In central Baghdad, a few dozen protesters looking for work at a US-backed local security force hurled rocks at the building. Flames and black smoke poured from a police car and a civilian vehicle while gunfire echoed around the area.
In the northern city of Mosul, a much larger crowd threw rocks at an employment office before marching to a local government building. Some storekeepers closed their shops.
Security guards fired shots in the air and the crowd began to disperse. At the Baghdad protest, which took place near a hotel where many Western journalists and other foreign workers are based, police fired automatic rifles and pistols as demonstrators took cover behind nearby buildings.
"We didn't shoot at the beginning. We think this is a democracy and they can express their point of view. But then they started firing," policeman Mr Falah Hassan said at the scene. He said several people were wounded.
The violence lasted for around half an hour. US troops arrived in the aftermath and secured the area. Protesters said they had come repeatedly to the office of a force set up to guard state property to look for work.