Kathmandu,

July 28,

Hundreds of Iraqi demonstrators, most of them followers of the Iraqi Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr, have stormed the parliament building in Baghdad to protest against the nomination for prime minister by Iran-backed parties.

The demonstrators, all of them men, were seen walking on tables of the parliament floor, leafing through folders, sitting in the chairs of politicians and waving Iraqi flags.

The incident raised the stakes in the political struggle for Iraq nearly 10 months after federal elections.