BAGHDAD - Just hours after
the United States-led coalition in Iraq confirmed that
US forces had suspended offensive operations against
militiamen loyal to Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in
the holy city of Najaf, US troops clashed with his Mahdi
Army fighters near the city.
Reports from the
south said sporadic gunfire broke out on Friday morning
around Muqtada's home mosque at Kufa, just outside
Najaf, and US tanks cordoned off the area. Witnesses
were reported as saying that they heard explosions
earlier. Muqtada normally preaches the Friday noon
sermon at the Kufa Mosque.
In another
development, two Japanese journalists were reported
killed in an attack on their car in a well-known danger
spot for banditry south of Baghdad. The Japanese Foreign
Ministry confirmed the attack, which took place on
Thursday, involving Shinsuke Hashida, a 61-year-old
freelance journalist and veteran of war-zone reporting
based in Bangkok, and his nephew Kotaro Ogawa, 33, from
the western Japanese city of Tottori.
The deaths
bring to four the number of Japanese killed in Iraq
since the US-led invasion last year. Two Japanese
diplomats were killed in late November when their car
was attacked near Tikrit. Five Japanese civilians were
among dozens of foreigners taken hostage in Iraq.
Militants had threatened to kill three of the hostages
unless Japan withdrew its troops, but the three, as well
as two others, were later released unharmed.
In
Najaf, it is not clear whether the fighters on the
outskirts on Friday were still under orders from
Muqtada, who appears to have yielded to pressure from
Shi'ite Muslim elders dismayed at weeks of bloodshed.
US officials, who took no part in negotiating
with Muqtada, said they would suspend offensive
operations in response to his pulling fighters off the
streets. But they had warned him that they would return
fire if they came under attack.
The break in
fighting will come as a relief to US forces. Last month,
after weeks of heavy fighting in the Sunni city of
Fallujah, the US handed over security to an Iraqi force
led by a former Ba'ath Party officer. The town has been
quiet since then. A similar model could now be adopted
in Najaf.
Dan Senor, spokesman for the US-led
administration, told a news conference that the US Army
would gradually hand over responsibility for security to
Iraqi police in Najaf. But Senor said Muqtada would
still have to fulfill the commitments he made to the
Shi'ite leaders. "We are hopeful that Muqtada al-Sadr
will live up to the commitments he made in this letter.
If Muqtada al-Sadr does in fact live up to the
commitments he made to the Shi'ite house, we will play
our part," Senor said. But Senor said the coalition has
not altered its position "with regard to the need to
dissolve and disarm Muqtada al-Sadr's militia" or to
have him arrested on murder charges.
Muqtada on
Thursday offered to withdraw his militiamen from Najaf
as part of a new offer to end his uprising. The news
came amid reports that mainstream Shi'ite leaders are
putting heavy pressure on him to resolve a crisis that
has disrupted normal life in Shi'ite shrine cities.
Armed supporters were said to be ready to withdraw from
the southern shrine city as part of the peace proposal.
A senior Iraqi official said that Muqtada
proposed withdrawing all of his fighters who are not
natives of Najaf from the city. Iraq National Security
Adviser Muwaffaq al-Rubay'i said that, in exchange,
Muqtada wanted US troops also to pull back from the
city.
Al-Rubay'i read out an English translation
of Muqtada's peace offer at a news conference in
Baghdad. The offer was contained in a letter addressed
to Shi'ite religious leaders in Najaf: "Honorable
brother members of the Shi'ite house, the peace and the
mercy and the blessing of God be upon you. To put an end
to the tragic situation in noble Najaf, and to put an
end to the violation of the sanctity of the sacred
shrine of Imam Ali, and the rest of the noble sites, I
announce my agreement to the following plan."
In
addition to withdrawing armed fighters, Muqtada offered
to return any government buildings they now occupied to
government use. He also agreed to open the way for
police and other Iraqi security forces to return to
their duties. And he agreed to open discussions with
senior Shi'ite religious leaders over the ultimate fate
of Muqtada's Mahdi Army.
An aide to preeminent
Shi'ite Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani was reported as
saying that al-Sistani had persuaded Muqtada to make
peace. Hamad al-Khafaf said Sistani did so because he
feared that US forces might soon storm Najaf.
US
officials rejected mutual withdrawal conditions offered
by Muqtada earlier in May.
The cleric has
previously demanded that the US-led Coalition
Provisional Authority drop murder charges against him,
something the CPA has said it will not do. Muqtada's
militiamen have fought sporadically with coalition
forces in parts of southern Iraq and areas of Baghdad
since the CPA announced in April that it would arrest
Muqtada in connection with the slaying of a rival
Western-leaning Shi'ite cleric in Najaf last year.
A top representative in Baghdad for Muqtada
confirmed to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL)
that the cleric was negotiating only with Shi'ite
community leaders and not directly with US officials.
Asad Turki Swari, the spokesman for Muqtada in
western Baghdad's al-Karkh district, said US officials
have not put forward any peace offers of their own. He
also accused US forces of deliberately damaging one of
the holiest Shi'ite shrines, the Imam Ali Shrine in
Najaf, in fighting this week.
"The negotiation
was and is still between Shi'ites, and I can't imagine
[negotiating with] the Americans, because they negotiate
with arrogance," Swari said. "They haven't submitted any
plan or ideas, and their last attack was on our holy
Imam [Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf]. The Americans used
weapons which the Mahdi Army uses, so that the attack
would be interpreted as an attack by the Mahdi Army and
so that there would be conflicts between Shi'ites."
US commanders have said their forces did not
fire the mortar round that slightly damaged the mosque
complex on Tuesday. US officials charge Muqtada's
supporters with using holy places to store weapons and
seek shelter.
Sawri said Muqtada wants US troops
out of Najaf and for Washington to allow what he called
"free and fair" elections in Iraq. "The demand of
Muqtada is clear, that [the Americans] leave the city,
release prisoners, especially the students of al-Hawza
[the Shi'ite religious establishment], stop attacking
our holy places and stop degrading Muslims, and have
free and honest elections with the supervision of the
Islamic organization [Organization of the Islamic
Conference] and the Arab League, and to ensure freedom
of speech and not confront people with bullets, as
Saddam [Hussein] used to do," Sawri said.
Muqtada has been in conflict with the US-led
occupation authorities almost since US troops entered
Iraq last year. He has refused to participate in the
US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council and has repeatedly
called for foreign forces to leave the country. His
armed uprising has put him in increasing conflict with
many mainstream Shi'ite religious leaders, who say it
endangers Shi'ite shrines and is motivated by personal
ambition.
Muqtada, a mid-level cleric in his
early 30s, is the son of a preeminent ayatollah who was
killed by presumed agents of Saddam in 1999. Since
inheriting control of his father's religious foundation
- one of the largest in Iraq - Muqtada has sought to
become a political force at the expense of other, much
more senior Shi'ite religious leaders.
Sistani
had previously called for both US forces and Muqtada
militants to stay out of Najaf and Karbala. Residents of
both shrine cities are reported to increasingly resent
the Mahdi Army's presence, as fighting disrupts normal
economic life. Last week, Sistani called on residents of
the two holy cities to protest against the presence of
armed forces in the towns.
Local pressure is
reported to have already calmed the situation in
Karbala, which was the scene of heavy fighting this
month. Several hundred residents took to the streets on
May 21 with banners proclaiming, "Karbala is a city of
peace."
The marchers in Karbala were protected
by members of the militia of the best-organized Shi'ite
political party, the Supreme Council of the Islamic
Revolution in Iraq. That party - whose militia is
considered to be as strong as Muqtada's - participates
in the Iraqi Governing Council and views cooperation
with the coalition as the best way to assure a strong
Shi'ite representation in Iraq's future governments. In
past decades, the community was repressed by regimes
based in Iraq's Sunni minority community.
A
resident of Karbala told RFE/RL that there has been no
renewed fighting in that city for several days and that
life there is returning to normal. Ahmad Wahid Abid
al-Hussein said by telephone from Karbala that Iraqi
police are back on the streets and schools have reopened
for children to take their annual final exams: "At the
moment, Karbala is quiet and stable and everything has
gone back to normal. The police are back on the streets,
official government offices are back to normal, schools,
too, are back to normal. [US troops] went back to their
previous positions [outside the town] and, concerning
the Mahdi Army, they went back to their places, or maybe
they went somewhere else, but they are not in Karbala.
Karbala is completely stable, and we have normal
electricity and the shops are open."
(Radio Free
Europe/Radio Liberty, Asia Times Online.)
