Iraq PM demands protesters leave US embassy 'immediately'

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraq’s caretaker premier Adel Abdel Mahdi says crowds that had stormed the US embassy protesting deadly US airstrikes against pro-Iran Iraqi Shiite militias should leave the compound “immediately.”

Demonstrators breached the embassy walls in protest of the Sunday strikes that killed at least 25 fighters from a pro-Iran faction known as Kataeb Hezbollah.

“We recall that any aggression or harassment of foreign embassies will be firmly prohibited by the security forces,” Abdel Mahdi’s office says, several hours after the attack began.

The US strikes were in response to rocket fire by Kataeb Hezbollah that killed a US contractor last week.

— AFP