MANAMA, Bahrain, March 6 (UPI) -- Protesters surrounded Bahrain's Cabinet building Sunday, forcing a halt to government business, security officials said.
There was no report of violence, although riot police and security helicopters were deployed around Manama, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Demonstrators demanded that the prime minister, Sheikh Khalifa bin Salman al-Khalifa, "step down before (Libyan dictator Moammar) Gadhafi," The Financial Times reported. In power for 41 years, he is the uncle of King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa.
The ruling Sunni Khalifa family has been rocked by weeks of protest by the disenfranchised Shiite majority.
Ebrahim Sharif, head of the National Democratic Action Society, told the Journal the opposition didn't want violence that's occurred this year in other Arabic countries.
"We are attacking peacefully all the institutions of state," he said. "This is really a regime change without overthrowing the monarchy."
The government announced the creation of 20,000 new jobs in the Interior Ministry Saturday, a major expansion of the security forces of on a nation of 1.2 million.
The ministry also said it was moving to secure Hamad where Shiite youths clashed Thursday with recently naturalized Sunni immigrants. Shiites say the government is trying shift the sectarian balance.
An opposition coalition submitted demands to the Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa for a provisional government before the national dialogue he says he wants.
