Tens of thousands of Iraqis, many chanting "Death to America," on Saturday mourned a top Iranian commander and others killed in a US drone attack that sparked fears of a regional proxy war between Washington and Tehran.
The killing of Iran's Major General Qasem Soleimani on Friday was the most dramatic escalation yet in spiralling tensions between Iran and the United States, which pledged to send thousands more troops to the region.
Iraqi political leaders and clerics attended the mass ceremony to honour 62-year-old Soleimani and the other nine victims of the pre-dawn attack on Baghdad international airport, reported AFP.
The strike killed a total of five Iranian Guards and five members of Iraq's Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary network, whose members have close ties to Tehran.
Among the dead was the Hashed's deputy Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, who was a top adviser and personal friend to Soleimani.
Mass ceremonies started in Baghdad on Saturday for the dead, with Iraq's caretaker premier Adel Abdel Mahdi and top pro-Iran figures in large crowds accompanying the coffins.
They were first brought to a revered Shia shrine in northern Baghdad, where thousands of mourners chanted "Death to America!"
Soleimani's body was set to be taken in southwestern Iranian province of Khuzestan, that borders Iraq, on Saturday. on Sunday it will be taken to the Shia holy city of Mashhad in Iran's northeast and from there to Tehran and his hometown Kerman in the southeast for burial on Tuesday, reports Reuters.
Dressed in black, they waved white Hashed flags and massive portraits of Iranian and Iraqi leaders, furiously calling for "revenge."
The remains were then moved to the shrine city of Karbala and would ultimately end up in Najaf, where the Iraqis will be buried.
The Guards' remains would be flown to Iran, which has declared three days of mourning and religious rituals.
As head of the Guards' foreign operations arm, the Quds Force, Soleimani was a powerful figure domestically and oversaw Iran's wide-ranging interventions in regional power struggles.
He had long been considered a lethal foe by Washington, with US President Donald Trump saying he should have been killed "many years ago."
US President Donald Trump said he had decided to "terminate" Iran's military mastermind to prevent an "imminent" attack on US diplomats and troops, reports AFP.
But a furious Iran has vowed revenge for the killing of Soleimani, the chief architect of its military operations across the Middle East.
"The response for a military action is a military action," Iranian ambassador to the United Nations Majid Takht Ravanchi told CNN. "By whom, by when, where? That is for the future to witness."
Tehran has already named Soleimani's deputy, Esmail Qaani, to replace him.
His first order of business was made clear on Friday when Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei promised "severe revenge" for Soleimani's death.
Fear of impending war
In Iran, some people worried that Soleimani's death might push the country into ruinous war with a superpower.
"I feel so sad for Soleimani's death but what if America and Iran start a war? I have children. What if they send my (university student) son to war?" said Monireh, a retired teacher.
Gholamali Abuhamzeh, a senior commander of the Revolutionary Guards, said Tehran would punish Americans "wherever they are in reach," and raised the prospect of possible attacks on ships in the Gulf.
The US Embassy in Baghdad urged American citizens to leave Iraq. Dozens of American employees of foreign oil companies left the southern Iraqi city of Basra on Friday.
Close US ally Britain warned its nationals to avoid all travel to Iraq, outside the autonomous Kurdistan region, and to avoid all but essential travel to Iran.
Iraqis worry the US strike could unleash a new wave of destabilization for Iraq, which only two years ago announced it had defeated the Islamic State (IS) group.
Abdel Mahdi warned on Friday it would "spark a devastating war in Iraq," while President Barham Saleh pleaded for "voices of reason" to prevail.
On Saturday, the Hashed said a new strike had hit a convoy of their forces north of Baghdad, with Iraqi state media blaming the US.
But US-led coalition spokesman Myles Caggins denied involvement, telling AFP: "There was no American or coalition strike."
Iraq's pro-Iran factions have seized on Soleimani's death to push parliament, which convenes on Sunday, to revoke the security agreement allowing US forces on Iraqi soil.
While praying over Muhandis's remains in Baghdad, top Hashed official Hadi al-Ameri pledged to avenge him by ousting US troops.
"Be reassured that the price of your pure blood will be the departure of American troops from Iraq, forever," he said.
More US troops in Iraq
Amid the tensions, the Pentagon said up to 3,500 additional US troops would be dispatched to Iraq's neighbour Kuwait, to boost some 14,000 reinforcements already deployed to the region last year.
About 5,200 US troops are stationed across Iraq to help fight IS.
They have faced a spate of rocket attacks that the US has blamed on pro-Iran factions and which last month killed an American contractor.
As a result of the tensions, Nato said it was suspending its training activities in Iraq and a US defence official told AFP that American-led coalition forces would "limit" operations.
"Our first priority is protecting coalition personnel," the official said, adding that the main focus of surveillance had shifted from IS to watching for incoming rocket attacks.
Iraq's defence ministry had not been informed of the changes, its spokesman told AFP on Saturday.