Iraq's Sadr Urges Men to Fight Even if He Dies
Wed Aug 11, 2004 07:42 AM ET
By Khaled Farhan
NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - A radical Shi'ite Muslim cleric urged his militia on Wednesday to keep fighting U.S. forces in Iraq even if he is killed, raising the stakes in a bloody confrontation that shows no sign of ending.
The challenge from Moqtada al-Sadr came as sporadic clashes echoed from the heart of the southern city of Najaf, where hundreds have been killed or wounded in the past week around some of Iraq's holiest Shi'ite Muslim sites.
"Keep fighting even if you see me a prisoner or a martyr. God willing you will be victorious," Sadr said in a statement from Najaf, where he is holed up with his fighters.
In fresh violence elsewhere, at least six Iraqis were killed and 10 wounded when a bomb exploded in a market just north of Baghdad, hospital sources said. Officials had no further details on the explosion in Khan Bani Saad village.
Clashes also broke out in Baghdad's Shi'ite slum district.
The fighting between U.S. forces and Sadr's Mehdi Army in Najaf, part of a broader Shi'ite uprising in at least seven southern and central cities, is the toughest challenge yet for the six-week-old administration of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.
The Shi'ite unrest has disrupted Iraq's vital oil exports and triggered a spike in world prices.
Iraq's exports were running at a reduced rate on Wednesday as engineers repaired a sabotaged pipeline feeding the country's southern terminals, oil officials and a shipping agent said.
Oil prices held strong near record highs. U.S. light crude was up 11 cents to $44.61 a barrel, below Tuesday's $45.04.
SPLIT OVER NAJAF
The crisis also appears to have created cracks in Allawi's administration after deputy president Ibrahim Jaafari urged U.S. troops to leave Najaf to end the fighting.
"I call for multinational forces to leave Najaf and for only Iraqi forces to remain there," Jaafari said in remarks broadcast on Al Jazeera television on Wednesday.
"Iraqi forces can administer Najaf to end this phenomenon of violence in this city that is holy to all Muslims."
U.S. forces have been pounding Sadr's militiamen in Najaf with warplanes and helicopters for days. The Iraqi fighters have taken sanctuary in the vast cemetery and inside the nearby Imam Ali Shrine.
Marines have cordoned off the area but have not made a full assault, a move that would enrage Iraq's majority Shi'ites. They have also said they were not hunting Sadr.
The cleric said he still wanted Iraq to remain united and thanked "those who tried to resolve the crisis peacefully."
In the past 24 hours, at least 30 Iraqis have been killed and 219 wounded in five cities including Baghdad, the Health Ministry said on Wednesday. The figure did not include Najaf.
U.S. forces say they have killed 360 Sadr loyalists so far in Najaf, home to 600,000 people some 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad. Sadr's spokesmen say far fewer have died during the second rebellion by the militia in four months.
Fighting erupted again in a Baghdad slum district called Sadr City where armed fighters have roamed at will. Two U.S. tanks thrust into the suburb, pursued by militiamen who fired at least one rocket propelled grenade at the vehicles.
In the southern town of Amara, British troops backed by planes launched an offensive against Shi'ite fighters overnight that the Mehdi Army said killed 10 militiamen. A British military spokesman said two British soldiers were wounded.
WHAT ROLE FOR SADR?
The latest fighting raises questions about what role Sadr wants to play in postwar Iraq, especially ahead of landmark elections scheduled for January. Allawi's attempts to bring Sadr into the political fold appear to have failed, for now.
Aged about 30 and a prominent figure in a revered clerical dynasty, he does not speak for all Iraq's Shi'ites but his tough anti-U.S. rhetoric has won him many admirers and swelled the ranks of his Mehdi militia.
In response to deputy president Jaafari's comments, spokesmen for the prime minister, president and the U.S. military appeared surprised but had no immediate reaction.
Jaafari is a respected politician who heads the Shi'ite Muslim Dawa Party, one of the largest Muslim groups in Iraq.
He told Jazeera the interim government should keep "political bridges open" with Sadr and his loyalists. But, he said, the administration should resort to "extraordinary" means if Sadr rejected the overtures and continued fighting.
In fresh attacks on Iraq's political elite, gunmen shot dead a local official of one of the country's main Shi'ite parties on Wednesday, an official of the group said.
Ali Mahmoud al-Saadi was attacked south of Baghdad. He was the top official for the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) in Diyala province.
(Additional reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis, Waleed Ibrahim and Matthew Green in Baghdad, Miral Fahmy in Dubai)
© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.
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