U.S. declares radical Shiite cleric an ''outlaw'' after clashes kill dozens; American troops seal of Fallujah
By Hamza Hendawi, Associated Press, 4/5/2004 05:07
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) <font size=4>The top U.S. administrator in Iraq declared a radical Shiite cleric an ''outlaw'' Monday after his supporters rioted in Baghdad and four other cities in fighting that killed at least 52 Iraqis, eight U.S. troops and a Salvadoran soldier. <font size=3>
The fiercest battle took place Sunday in the streets of Sadr City, Baghdad's largest Shiite neighborhood, where black-garbed Shiite militiamen fired from rooftops and behind buildings at U.S. troops, killing seven Americans. At least 30 Iraqis were killed and more than 110 wounded in the fighting, doctors said.
Meanwhile, U.S. troops on Monday sealed off Fallujah ahead of a major operation code named ''Vigilant Resolve,'' aimed at pacifying the city, one of the most violent cities in the Sunni Triangle, the heartland of the insurgency against the American occupation.
U.S. commanders have been vowing a massive response after insurgents killed four American security contractors in the city, west of Baghdad, on Wednesday. Residents dragged the Americans' bodies through the streets, hanging two of their charred corpses from a bridge, in horrifying scenes that showed the depth of anti-U.S. sentiment in the city.
Some 1,200 Marines and two battalions of Iraqi security forces were poised to enter the city in a raid to capture suspected insurgents, officials said. They would not say when the sweep would begin.
The insurgency that has plagued U.S. troops in Iraq for months has been led by Sunni Muslims. But Sunday's clashes in Baghdad and three other cities threatened to open a dangerous new front: a confrontation with Iraq's powerful Shiite Muslim majority, which has until now largely avoided violence with the Americans.
Hundreds were wounded in Sunday's violence in Baghdad, Najaf, Nasiriyah and Amarah. The riots were ignited by the arrest of an aide to anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Followers of al-Sadr also took over the offices of the governor in the southern city of Basra.
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In response, L. Paul Bremer, the top U.S. administrator in Iraq, declared al-Sadr an ''outlaw'' who threatens Iraq's security.
''Effectively he is attempting to establish his authority in the place of the legitimate authority. We will not tolerate this. We will reassert the law and order which the Iraqi people expect,'' Bremer told a security team meeting convened to discuss how to respond to Sadr.
Bremer did not say if U.S. authorities would move to arrest al-Sadr, but the declaration stepped up the confrontation with the 30-year-old firebrand cleric, who fiercely opposes the U.S. occupation and is backed by a militia known as the ''Al-Mahdi Army.''
''There is no room for militias in the new Iraq. ... If there are militias that seek to exert control, we will address that head on. And that is clearly what we are doing right now,'' a senior U.S. official said Monday.
Al-Sadr does not hold widespread support among Iraq's Shiites, where many see him as too young and inexperienced to lead. But he does have the backing of hundreds of young seminary students and many impoverished Shiites, devoted to him because of his anti-U.S. stance and the memory of his father, a Shiite religious leader gunned down by suspected Saddam agents in 1999. <font size=3>
The violence Sunday was a sign of al-Sadr's strength.
The U.S. troops moved into Baghdad's Sadr City named after Muqtada's father after militiamen took over five police stations in the neighborhood. At least two Humvees burned in the streets, and tanks rolled in, crushing cars.
Al-Chawadir hospital, one of two hospitals in Sadr City, received 28 dead Iraqis and 90 wounded from the fighting, said a doctor, Qassim Saddam. Another hospital reported two dead and 21 wounded.
By Monday morning, the militiamen had been forced out of the police stations, and U.S. tanks were parked in one of the neighborhood's main markets. Many stalls in the market were burned out, and buildings were pockmarked with bullet holes.
During a street protest by some 5,000 people Sunday near the Shiite holy city of Najaf, al-Sadr supporters opened fire on the base of Spanish troops, sparking a battle that lasted several hours.
Two soldiers a Salvadoran and an American died and at least nine other soldiers were wounded, the Spanish Defense Ministry said. Twenty-two Iraqis died and more than 200 were wounded, said Falah Mohammed, director of the Najaf health department.
In nearby Kufa, al-Sadr supporters took over a police station.
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Al-Sadr issued a statement later Sunday calling off street protests and saying he would stage a sit-in at a mosque in Kufa, where he has delivered fiery weekly sermons for months.
But the statement also called on followers to ''do what you see fit in your provinces. Strike terror in the heart of your enemy ... We can no longer be silent in the face of their abuses.''
Some of al-Sadr's followers in Baghdad said they interpreted this as a call for armed resistance against U.S. forces a call al-Sadr has refrained from directly making. <font size=3>
Several hundred supporters of al-Sadr demonstrated Monday in the Shiite neighborhood of Kazimiyah in Baghdad. Students staged a sit-in at Baghdad University, calling on the Al-Mahdi army to respond to Sunday's deaths.
Sunday's violence along with the unrelated killings of two Marines in Anbar province pushed the U.S. death toll in Iraq to at least 610.
The violence was touched off by the arrest of Mustafa al-Yacoubi, a senior aide to al-Sadr, on charges of murdering Abdel-Majid al-Khoei, a rival Shiite cleric. A total of 25 arrest warrants have been issued in the case, and 13 suspects have been taken into custody, an official at the coalition headquarters said.
Al-Sadr supporters also were angered by the March 28 closure of his weekly newspaper by U.S. officials. The Americans alleged the newspaper was inciting violence against coalition troops.
Militiamen demonstrating on Sunday against al-Yacoubi's detention also traded fire with Italian troops in the southern city of Nasiriyah and British troops in Amarah.
In other developments:
U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi met with members of Iraq's Governing Council on Monday as he launched a mission to help in the transition to an interim government after sovereignty is handed back to Iraqis on June 30. |
