Iraq's neighbors called for coalition forces to pull out of the country and for a representative government to be quickly formed in Baghdad amid mounting anti-US sentiment among ordinary Iraqis.

And US President George W. Bush was planning to ask the United Nations to lift sanctions against Baghdad in phases, leaving the UN in charge of Iraqi oil sales for the time being, said US newspaper reports.

Azzawi became the fifth person captured on the US military list of 55 most-wanted Iraqis when Iraqi police turned him over to coalition forces Friday, US military officials said in war command headquarters in Qatar.

The US Marine forces involved in the capture of Baghdad completely vanished from the capital's streets Saturday, replaced by lighter army units that will have the task of rebuilding the city's infrastructure and keeping order.

The army is traditionally responsible for civil affairs issues such as rebuilding security and water and electricity systems and a 30,000-strong task force from the Fourth Infantry is currently flowing into Iraq from Kuwait.

The forces will also have to take on the remnants of Saddam Hussein's die-hard Fedayeen militia and suicide bombers, who have claimed the lives of eight US soldiers in three blasts since the war began on March 20.

The troops will have to carry out their uphill task amid growing hostility to their presence from locals.

In the first full Friday prayers since the fall of Saddam Hussein's 24-year rule, thousands of Iraqis poured out of mosques after stinging anti-US sermons from clerics and marched against the coalition presence.

"We will not sell out our country," chanted some 10,000 to 12,000 angry protestors in Baghdad as they took part in a demonstration unheard of during Saddam's iron-fisted rule.

Leading Muslim clerics denounced the presence of US and British forces in the country, galvanizing Iraqis frustrated at the slow restoration of basic services such as water and power after the blistering three-week US-led offensive.

In Riyadh, the foreign ministers of Iraq's neighbours, plus Egypt and Bahrain, called for US and British forces to pull out.

At the end of a meeting to discuss the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's downfall, the ministers underlined the need to uphold Iraq's territorial integrity and called for a central role for the UN in the postwar period.

They also took issue with US claims that Syria was, among others, providing a safe haven for officials of the deposed Iraqi regime and backed a Syrian proposal -- essentially directed at Israel's suspected nuclear arsenal -- to turn the Middle East into a zone free of weapons of mass destruction.

The ministers "underlined the obligation of the occupying powers under the Fourth Geneva Convention to... withdraw from Iraq and allow the Iraqis to exercise their right to self-determination," they said in a joint declaration read by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal.

In Iraq's second-largest city of Basra, schools reopened for the first time since the start of the war.

On Iraq's border with Jordan, Jordanian customs officials seized 42 paintings that were taken from the Iraqi nation museum during widespread looting after the fall of Saddam's regime, said the Al Dustour newspaper.

Amid widespread speculation over the fate of toppled leader Saddam Hussein, Abu Dhabi television broadcast what it said was footage of crowds cheering Saddam in the streets of Baghdad on April 9, the day US forces swept into the capital.

The footage showed Saddam accompanied by what appeared to be his son Qusay, and surrounded by supporters chanting: "With our blood, with our soul, we will redeem you Saddam."

The channel also aired what it said was Saddam's most recent speech, recorded on April 9, in which he voiced confidence that Iraq would triumph and told the Iraqi people that the country's leadership was "steadfast."

US military tribunals in Iraq meanwhile have begun deciding the status of some 6,850 people taken prisoner during the war, a Pentagon spokesman said.

The US awarded a 50-million-dollar contract to a private, Virginia-based firm to recruit advisors to train police in post-war Iraq, the State Department and the company said.

"We have awarded a contract to DynCorp International to identify, deploy and support up to 1,000 police, justice and prison advisors to Iraq," said Brenda Greenberg, a department spokeswoman.

Khala Khadr al-Salahat, a member of the Abu Nidal Organization, a Palestinian militant group that figures on the US list of terrorist organizations, surrendered to US Marines in Baghdad, military officials said in Qatar.

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