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Muqtada al Sadr. Click to view. |
Posted on 04/21/2008 10:40:26 AM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach
MANAMA (Reuters) - The Iraqi government will not allow Shi'ite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to wage an "open war" in Iraq and will move to curb his militia, Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said on Monday.
Sadr, whose Mehdi Army militia has battled U.S. and Iraqi government forces, threatened on Saturday to launch an "open war until liberation" against the U.S.-backed government if it continued a month-old crackdown on his followers.
The threat was followed by what the U.S. military called the heaviest fighting for weeks in his east Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City.
"Of course nobody will accept open warfare in Iraq or allow the rule of militias to be established," Zebari told Reuters in Bahrain.
"The Iraq government will be very firm to confront all outlaw militias as was proven in Basra and other places," he added, referring to Iraq's southern oil city.
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice backed Iraq's crackdown on the militias in a visit on Sunday to Baghdad, where the worst fighting in weeks killed 23 people.
Asked whether the Iraqi government was capable of confronting Sadr, Zebari said: "It has already... Of course, anybody who challenges the authority of the state, the government has to move."
(Reporting by Mohammed Abbas, Writing by Lin Noueihed; editing by Sami Aboudi)
Confront? Bullshit. They need to EVAPORATE Mookie and his diaperheaded militia and leave their corpses in the street to rot as a warning to anyone else that might want to take up arms.
keep pushing. mookie is gonna run out of cannon fodder sooner or later. probably sooner if he’s trying to STOP the confrontations. if he was winning, he’d be continuing the fight.
and when he runs out of minions, maybe he’ll wind up next to uday...
you can’t be a martyr if you run out of followers.
Also from the LWJ:
Sadr threatens new uprising; Iraqi and US forces press attack
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By April 20, 2008 7:41 PM
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Muqtada al Sadr. Click to view. |
The battle between the Mahdi Army and Iraqi and US forces intensified over the weekend. As the Iraqi Army took control of a Mahdi Army stronghold in Basrah, Muqtada al Sadr, the leader of the Mahdi Army, threatened to end the self-imposed cease-fire. Iraqi security forces have also stepped up efforts against the Mahdi Army in the center-south region of Iraq, and captured more than 40 of the Iranian-backed Special Groups, a Mahdi Army splinter group.
Sadr threatened to end the cease-fire after Iraqi troops took over the Mahdi Army-dominated neighborhood of Hayaniyah in Basrah and ejected the Sadrist political party from government-owned offices in the city. He openly said he was prepared to revolt against the government.
"Do you want a third uprising?” Sadr said, referring to the two Mahdi Army uprisings in Baghdad, Najaf, and the South in April and August 2006. "So I direct my last warning and speech to the Iraqi government to refrain and to take the path of peace and abandon violence against its people. If the government does not refrain and leash the militias that have penetrated it, we will announce an open war until liberation."
The Iraqi government brushed off Sadr's comments and continued to maintain that the Mahdi Army must disarm while saying the Mahdi Army and the Sadrist movement was not a target. "The state can not withstand the existence of two armies," government spokesman Ali al Dabbagh said. Dabbagh also noted the government is not negotiating with the Sadrist movement. “We don’t have direct negotiations or contacts with the Sadr’s movement because we have nothing to negotiate with them but also we don’t have problems with the political factions,” he said.
The US military and government responded forcefully to Sadr's threat to end the ceasefire. "If Sadr and Jaish al-Mahdi (Mahdi Army) become very aggressive, we've got enough combat power to take the fight to the enemy," Major General Rick Lynch, the commander of US forces in Karbala, Najaf, Babil, Wasit, and southern Baghdad provinces told the US media.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza, who is currently visiting Iraq, taunted Sadr by implying he was hiding in Iran while ordering his fighters to oppose their government. "I know he's sitting in Iran," Rice said. "I guess its all-out war for anybody but him. I guess that's the message; his followers can go to their deaths and he's in Iran."
The cease-fire is all but over
The Mahdi Army cease-fire is all but dead, as the Mahdi Army has openly resisted the Iraqi government's attempts to assert control in Sadrist strongholds in Baghdad, Basrah, and the South. Sadr admitted his political movement issued orders to attack both US and Iraqi troops and has called for Iraqi soldiers and police to desert their units.
Sadr's forces have continued to attack Iraqi government forces despite a cease-fire. An incident on April 19 south of Nasariyah backfired on the Mahdi Army as 40 fighters were captured, including two leaders, after attempting to ambush Iraqi forces in Suq Ash Shuyukh. The Iraqi security forces responded by sending a joint force of soldiers, police, and special police to battle the Mahdi Army force.
The Mahdi Army forces "retreated to building that contained the local Sadr Trend office" after "facing a combination of armored vehicles and suppressive fire," Multinational Forces Iraq reported in a press release. Iraqi forces cleared the building and discovered a large weapons cache that included "explosively formed penetrators, Katyusha rockets, rocket propelled grenade launchers and a large quantity of additional weapons and ammunition." Iran has supplied explosively formed penetrators to the Mahdi Army and the Special Groups.
A local police chief said 39 Mahdi Army fighters were captured, while 22 people, including two policemen, were killed, while another 19 police were wounded during the fighting. Multinational Forces Iraq said 40 "criminals" were captured and 12 Iraqi soldiers were wounded.
US and Iraqi troops have been active in Baghdad and Sadr City as well. US soldiers killed 22 "criminals" and captured six during a series of engagements in Baghdad over the last 24 hours. On April 19, aerial weapons teams killed seven Mahdi Army fighters in Sadr City as they transported weapons and attacked US and Iraqi forces.
US troops killed 20 Mahdi Army fighters today during a series of engagements in the Adhamiyah, East Rashid, and Kadamiyah districts in Baghdad. Coalition special forces captured a "suspected Iranian-trained Special Groups commander" and three lieutenants and killed three others during a targeted raid in Kadamiyah. US soldiers killed 12 Mahdi Army fighters as they planted roadside bombs and attacked US forces in Adhamiyah and East Rashid. Another five Mahdi fighters were killed and two wounded by air weapons teams late in the afternoon on Sunday.
In Basrah, Iraqi troops conducted a cordon-and-search operation in the Al Kaziza region north of the city. Iraqi troops " captured a number of wanted men" and seized heavy and medium weapons during the operation.
In Karbala, Iraqi troops also found a weapons factory with a large weapons cache containing "80 IEDs, 130 detonation devices and 60 kg of TNT." Karbala police also captured an eight-man cell, including the cell leader. Police "confiscated their documents that include names of politicians and religious clergies' representatives in Karbala, aiming at eliminating and assassinating them."
Background on the fighting between the Mahdi Army and the Iraqi government
******************See the link for the rest of the article**********************
gotta say, i continue to be impressed with the spine of Maliki and the Iraq govt. It vastly exceeds the spine of most of our legislators in Washington.
Sadr threatens new uprising; Iraqi and US forces press attack
They got their butts kicked in the last two uprisings. This moron works with the same Iranian backed script Nasrallah does. “There will be this great victory anyday now........” and back in reality, they lose every battle.
Back off, Iran. NOW.
About time.
I believe that ol’mook has had his day... the govmint’s gonna go after him now.
Welcome aboard. Hope your stay is both pleasant and informative. The fat boy shall soon be rendered down one way or another.
Blowing each other up now. A good sign. I have a strong hunch the big one has plans on exiting the scene and living out a life of luxury just before attempts are made to jail him.
Sadr, whose Mehdi Army militia has battled U.S. and Iraqi government forces, threatened on Saturday to launch an "open war until liberation" against the U.S.-backed government if it continued a month-old crackdown on his followers.Sadr continued, "True, up until now we've been waging war against the occupation government, but it's no more Mister Nice Guy."
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