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=> Allawi is acting like a total puppet.

Allawi is acting like a total puppet.
Posted by Habibi (Guest) - Thursday, August 19 2004, 16:41:45 (CEST)
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Gotta love Condi's remark below. Like she matters anyways.... Why the hell should Iraqis care what she thinks about the situation? She is absolutely CLUELESS when it comes to anything Mid Eastern! And what's this about her not trusting al-Sadr? We have plenty of evidence, here in the U.S., that Condi is the one who can't be trusted! Furthermore, I believe that al-Sadr has been acting just as he promised, but that U.S. troops have been continuing to attack, going against a truce. What choice does al-Sadr have but to fight back? Allawi and the U.S. government want al-Sadr dead because al-Sadr represents a truly democratic voice.

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http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsPackageArticle.jhtml?type=topNews&storyID=568226§ion=news
Fierce fighting erupts in Najaf
Thu 19 August, 2004 14:11
By Michael Georgy

NAJAF, Iraq (Reuters) - Fierce fighting has erupted in the city of Najaf after a rebel Shi'ite cleric defied an Iraqi government threat to attack his stronghold in a holy shrine and rejected demands that he end his uprising.

Thick black smoke poured into the sky on Thursday from near the Imam Ali Mosque, soon after Moqtada al-Sadr spurned the ultimatum from interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.U.S. aircraft and tanks pounded the area around the shrine.

It was not immediately clear if the government's threatened offensive was under way at the mosque, where the radical cleric and his Mehdi Army militia have holed up.

Away from the mosque area, three mortar bombs hit a Najaf police station in quick succession, killing seven police and wounding 21 others, police said.

Sadr reverted to his trademark defiance after two days in which he had appeared to be willing to disarm his militia and leave Iraq's holiest Shi'ite shrine.

Asked about the latest government demands, Sheikh Ahmed al-Sheibani, a senior Sadr aide and Mehdi Army commander, told reporters inside the mosque: "It is very clear that we reject them."

The two-week rebellion has badly dented Allawi's authority, killed hundreds and rattled world oil markets. Oil prices hit a new record of $47.95 for a barrel of U.S. light crude.

Iraqi Minister of State Kasim Daoud told a news conference in Najaf the government had exhausted all peaceful means to persuade Sadr to back down and was determined to impose a military solution unless the cleric surrendered.

He said the scion of a respected Shi'ite clerical dynasty was facing his "final hours" before an attack.

Daoud vowed to liberate the Imam Ali but declined to say whether the government would storm the site itself.

Any such assault could provoke outrage among Iraq's majority Shi'ite community, especially if U.S. forces are involved.

U.S. troops in Baghdad overran the firebrand cleric's stronghold in the sprawling Shi'ite slum of Sadr City with tanks and armoured vehicles, meeting little resistance, witnesses said. They later withdrew to the outskirts of the area.

SCEPTICISM

Sadr said on Wednesday his militia forces would disarm and leave the mosque if a truce was agreed with 2,000 U.S. marines encircling the city, who have pounded his militia for two weeks with warplanes, helicopter gunships and tanks.

He made his apparent concession after the government threatened to teach the Mehdi militia "a lesson they will never forget". His subsequent posturing aroused scepticism among U.S. officials that he would back down.

"I don't think we can trust al-Sadr. I think we have to see action, not just words," National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told Fox News.

Most Najaf residents too were sceptical fighting would end.

"What peace? I don't believe it. Look at this hell," said Talib Moussa, a 35-year-old labourer.

U.S. armoured vehicles were deployed along the main roads in Baghdad's Sadr City, a slum of two million people where fierce fighting has broken out in the past two weeks.

U.S. forces said they had killed 50 militiamen on Wednesday in their push into Sadr City.

Sadr has more than once vowed to fight to the death in Najaf and has proved a wily strategist in past confrontations.

Despite the plump, bearded cleric's youth -- he is about 30 -- the latest rebellion has transformed him into the most recognisable face of resistance to the U.S. presence in Iraq.

One U.S. marine was killed in action in Najaf on Wednesday, the U.S. military said. More than 700 U.S. troops have died in action since the start of last year's U.S.-led invasion.

Al Jazeera television reported that Iraqi militants who said they captured a U.S. journalist last week had threatened to kill him within 48 hours unless U.S. forces left Najaf.

It showed footage of a man with a moustache kneeling in front of five masked men holding rifles. The channel identified the man as Micah Garen and the group as the Martyrs Brigades.



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