04 December 2004	Saturday	21 Shawwal 1425

ISTANBUL, Dec 3: Several hundred people demonstrated outside the British consulate in Istanbul on Friday at the call of an Islamist movement against the presence of British troops in Iraq, after a march through the city.

The marchers, who began at a city centre mosque, carried a banner saying "Infidel imperialists out of Iraq" and hung a black flag on the wall of the consulate before dispersing.

Bulent Yildirim, head of a group calling itself the Association of Rights and Freedoms, told Anatolia news agency, "Intelligence cooperation between the United States, Britain and Turkey must be stopped. Otherwise we will organize actions at every consulate, and if necessary will assembly 50,000 or 100,000 people at the US consulate."

Protests against operations by US-led forces in neighbouring Iraq have stepped up in Turkey since the US assault against insurgents in the Iraqi city of Fallujah last month.

On November 20 last year suicide bomb attacks on the British consulate and a British bank here killed 33 people, including consul-general Roger Short and nine of his staff. -AFP