Al-Sadr threatens to end cease-fire
BAGHDAD (AP) - February 20, 2008 Iraqi police, meanwhile, held funerals Wednesday for 14 officers
killed the night before as they responded to a rocket attack
launched from a predominantly Shiite neighborhood against U.S.
bases in the capital.
A U.S. military spokesman also said a U.S. civilian was killed
and a number of U.S. troops and civilian personnel were wounded in
a previously unreported rocket attack in the southeastern area of
Rustamiyah on Tuesday night.
Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a U.S. military spokesman, did not
elaborate, but there is a U.S. base in the predominantly Shiite
area.
In a separate attack, three American troops were killed by a
roadside bomb Tuesday night in northwestern Baghdad, the U.S.
military said.
Al-Sadr's Shiite Mahdi Army is among the most powerful militias
in Iraq, and the cease-fire he ordered last August has been
credited with helping reduce violence around Iraq by 60 percent or
more in the past six months.
Sheik Salah al-Obeidi, a spokesman for al-Sadr in the Shiite
holy city of Najaf, said that if the cleric failed to issue a
statement by Saturday saying the cease-fire was extended, "then
that means the freeze is over." Al-Sadr's followers would be free
to resume attacks.
On an Internet site representing al-Sadr, al-Obeidi said that
al-Sadr "either will announce the extension or will stay silent
and not announce anything. If stays silent, that means that the
freeze is over."
Al-Obeidi said that message "has been conveyed to all Mahdi
Army members nationwide."
Smith, the U.S. military spokesman, said in an e-mailed
statement that the cease-fire declared by al-Sadr's last August was
good for the Iraqi people.
"Al-Sayyid Muqtada al-Sadr's cease-fire has been helpful in
reducing violence and has led to improved security in Iraq. We
would welcome the extension of the cease-fire as a positive step,"
he said, using an honorific reserved for descendants of the Prophet
Muhammad.
While the U.S. has welcomed the cease-fire, it also has insisted
on continuing to stage raids against what it calls Iranian-backed
breakaway factions of the Mahdi Army militia - moves that have
angered the cleric's followers.
Influential members of al-Sadr's movement said earlier this
month they had urged the radical cleric to call off the cease-fire,
which initially was set to expire at the end of the month.
Al-Sadr's followers have claimed the U.S.-Iraqi raids,
particularly in the southern Shiite cities of Diwaniyah, Basra and
Karbala, are a pretext to crack down on the wider movement, which
has pulled its support for the Washington-backed government.
A Sunni parliament member, Asmaa al-Dulaimi, said if the truce
were broken it would hurt the prospects for national reconciliation
and "further deteriorate the security situation nationwide."
"Resuming their activities, whether against the government or
civilians, will lead to a new confrontation with them," she said.
Smith, at a news conference Wednesday, blamed Iranian-backed
Shiite militias for a series of deadly rocket attacks in Baghdad,
the most intense to hit the capital in weeks amid a steep decline
in violence since a U.S.-Iraq campaign against Sunni and Shiite
extremists began a year ago Feb. 14.
Rockets slammed into U.S. outposts in Baghdad Tuesday night and
Smith said three U.S. soldiers were wounded, instead of four as was
previously announced.
Iraqi police responding to the attack found an abandoned truck
loaded with rockets, but one of them exploded before it could be
defused.
Brig. Gen. Jihad al-Jubouri, head of the anti-bombing squad at
the Interior Ministry, said 11 bomb experts and three other
officers were killed. Officials initially had said that as many as
15 police were slain and up to 27 wounded.
On Wednesday, a band played as four pick-up trucks carried the
coffins of the slain Iraqi police in a slow-moving funeral
procession. Interior Minister Jawad al-Bolani walked with other
officials at the back of the line.
"Their selfless bravery no doubt saved the lives of countless
innocent Iraqis had the special groups been able to successfully
fire from the truck," said Smith, the U.S. military spokesman.
On Monday, 16 rockets slammed into an Iraqi housing complex near
the Baghdad international airport and Camp Victory, the main U.S.
military headquarters, killing at least five people and wounding
16, including two U.S. soldiers.
Six Iraqi suspects detained near the launching sites all had
explosives residue on their bodies, Smith said, adding that troops
also seized 19 launching systems, one 107 mm rocket ready to be
fired and other high explosives and munitions.
Meanwhile, three Iraqi children were killed and seven others
wounded when they were hit by an insurgent mortar attack while
playing soccer outside a military supply area on Tuesday near
Balad, Smith said.
And in Diyala province north of Baghdad, where U.S. and Iraqi
forces are working to push out al-Qaida in Iraq, a suicide bomber's
belt detonated near a line of people who were buying bread
Wednesday, killing seven and wounding 17, said an official in the
provincial command operation center. The official spoke on
condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to release the
information.
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Associated Press writers Bradley Brooks and Sinan Salaheddin
contributed to this report.