It was a victory for Sadr Are you "Baghdad Bob"? I think you should apply for a job as Sadr's PR spokesperson.
Sadr started a rebellion in the hopes it would catch fire with the 60% of Iraq's population which is Shiite. His stated purpose was to drive America from Iraq and establish a government with himself at the head. “The occupation is over! Sadr is our ruler!” was the cry of his followers. ( google.com )
But the rebellion was not embraced by the Shiite masses. More influential Shiite leaders denounced it. His Mehdi army was chased out of the Sadr City slum, then Karbala. Then his Mehdi Army was confined to Najaf and Kufa and wore out their welcome there. Finally he agreed to end hostilities and accept the interim government after losing thousands of Mehdi Army members from both death and desertion.
Sadr tells militiamen to go home
NAJAF — Iraqi cleric Moqtada Sadr yesterday told members of his armed militia who do not live in this holy city to go home, in a key step toward peace in Najaf after fierce clashes with US troops.
The announcement came a day after Iraq’s new president Sheikh Ghazi Al Yawar said Sadr could join national politics if he is found innocent of murder charges and agrees to disband his Mehdi Army militia.
“Members of the Mehdi Army who have agreed to make sacrifices ... are asked to return to their regions” of origin, said a brief statement from the cleric published in Najaf, 100 miles south of Baghdad.
In a letter made public on May 27, which helped to forge a truce between Sadr’s followers and the US military, the young Shiite leader said he accepted the principle of sending home those of his men who were not Najaf residents.
Prior to the release of the latest statement, a representative of senior Shiite cleric and politician Mohammed Bahr Al Ulum said that an agreement had been struck overnight on returning Iraqi police to the city.
“We arrived at an agreement on deploying police forces to Najaf, which gives the forces of law and order the right to arrest anyone who breaks the law,” said the representative, Ali Ghrifi. According to Ghrifi, the deal was struck at a meeting of representatives of the “Shiite House”, which groups the leaders of Iraq’s majority Shiite population and has been closely involved in mediating between Sadr and the US Army.
But a Sadr spokesman said allowing Iraqi police to restart full duties in the city centre depended upon Najaf’s senior clerics, the Marjayah.
“Whether or not to allow Iraqi police to enter the holy city is something related to the situation at the holy shrine,” said the spokesman, Sheikh Qais Al Khazali, referring to the Hazrat Ali (may God be pleased with him)’s mausoleum, one of the holiest shrines, which is under the control of Sadr’s men.
“It is up to the Marjayah either to allow police in or to assign special squads to guard the holy shrine,” he said.
On Monday, one of the Shiite negotiators indicated that the future of the Mehdi Army was under discussion, after a high-level meeting in Baghdad.
“We are talking about this question and we need to return to the issue,” said Hadi Amiri, secretary-general of the Badr Organisation, formerly the militia of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). Amiri said his group met with a Shiite delegation of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, Vice-President Ibrahim Jaafari and National Security Adviser Muwaffiq Rubaie.
Talks at the meeting focused on implementing three main points of Sadr’s May letter, in which he vowed to return public buildings in the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala to the authorities and withdraw militiamen who are not from the area.
He also demanded the suspension of any legal proceedings against his followers.
A fourth point, still under discussion, concerned the future of the Mehdi Army and judicial proceedings against Sadr, who has an Iraqi arrest warrant against him for alleged involvement in the murder of a pro-Western Shiite cleric in May 2003.
Sadr, who has waged a two-and-a-half-month-old uprising against the US-led coalition, indicated in recent days that he was mulling a deal with the new interim government to drop his resistance to the emerging political order. — AFP
timesofoman.com
In reversal, rebel cleric al-Sadr endorses interim Iraqi government
BY EDWARD WONG
NEW YORK TIMES
BAGHDAD, Iraq - The anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr on Friday endorsed the new interim Iraqi government and appeared to urge his followers to honor a week-old cease-fire that has been frayed by continuing violence.
A senior aide to al-Sadr, Sheik Jabir al-Khafaji, used a sermon during Friday Prayers in the al-Sadr stronghold of Kufa, 120 miles south of Baghdad, to announce that al-Sadr now approved of the interim government he had previously mocked and that he wanted its leaders to set a timetable for the departure of occupation forces.
" 'From now on, I beg you to start afresh for Iraq for the sake of peace and safety,' " Khafaji quoted al-Sadr as saying. " 'We have to avoid pushing humiliation and aggression on others and go forward with the independence of Iraq and not respond to the occupiers.' "
Those words represent a radical reversal of al-Sadr's past position. They could also represent an effort by al-Sadr to be become involved in the politics of the nation, rather than continue as a leader of a 10-week-old insurgent struggle.
duluthsuperior.com |
