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Britain
Secret deal with al-Mahdi militia kept Brits out of Basra battle
2008-08-07
A secret deal between Britain and the notorious al-Mahdi militia prevented British Forces from coming to the aid of their US and Iraqi allies for nearly a week during the battle for Basra this year, The Times has learnt.

The deal, which aimed to encourage the Shia movement back into the political process and marginalise extremist factions, has dealt a huge blow to Britain's reputation in Iraq. Under its terms, no British soldier could enter Basra without the permission of Des Browne, the Defence Secretary. By the time he gave his approval, most of the fighting was over and the damage to Britain's reputation had already been done.

The Ministry of Defence has never confirmed that there was a deal with al-Mahdi Army, but one official denied that the delay in sending in troops was because of the arrangement agreed with the Shia militia. A spokesman for the MoD said that the reason why troops were not sent immediately into Basra was because there was "no structure in place" in the city for units to go back in to start mentoring the Iraqi troops.

Colonel Imad, who heads the 2nd Battalion, 1st Brigade, 1st Iraqi Army Division, the most experienced division, commanded one of the quick-reaction battalions summoned to assist British-trained local forces, who faltered from the outset because of inexperience and lack of support. He said: "Without the support of the Americans we would not have accomplished the mission because the British Forces had done nothing there. I do not trust the British Forces. They did not want to lose any soldiers for the mission."

Lieutenant-Colonel Chuck Western, a senior US Marine advising the Iraqi Army, told The Times: "I was not happy. Everybody just assumed that because this deal was cut nobody was going in. Cutting a deal with the bad guys is generally not a good idea." He emphasised, however, that he was not being critical of the British military, which he described as first-rate.

Captain Eric Whyne, another US Marine officer who took part in the battle, said that he was astounded that "a coalition force would make a pact with essentially their enemy and promise not to go into their area so as not to get attacked". He alleged that "some horrific atrocities" were committed by the militia in Basra during the British watch.

A senior British defence source agreed that the battle for Basra had been damaging to Britain's reputation in Iraq. "You can accuse the Americans of many things, such as hamfistedness, but you can't accuse them of not addressing a situation when it arises. While we had a strategy of evasion, the Americans just went in and addressed the problem."

Another British official said that the deal was intended as an IRA-style reconciliation. "That is what we were trying to do but it did not work." The official added that "accommodation" had become a dirty word.

US officials knew of the discussions, which continued until March this year. They facilitated the peaceful exit of British troops from a palace compound in Basra last September in return for the release of a number of prisoners. The arrangement fell apart on March 25 when Mr al-Maliki ordered his surprise assault on Basra, catching both the Americans and British off-guard.

The Americans responded by flying in reinforcements, providing air cover and offering the logistical and other support needed for the Iraqis to win.

The British were partly handicapped because their commander, Major-General Barney White-Spunner, was away on a skiing holiday when the attack began. When Brigadier Julian Free, his deputy, arrived to discuss the situation with Mr al-Maliki at the presidential palace in Basra, he was made to wait outside.
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Iraq
Al-Mahdi Army militias routed without a shot fired
2008-06-20
Another successful operation by what may be now the best Arab army on the planet.
They came at dawn, thousands of Iraqi troops and US special forces on a mission to reclaim a lawless city from the militias who ran it. By the end of the day, al-Amarah was under Iraqi Government control - without a shot being fired.

The city had been taken over by the Shia al-Mahdi Army two years ago after British troops handed it to an ill-prepared Iraqi Army. “We can't say al-Amarah was entirely bad, there are good people here, poor people. But the city was controlled by the al-Mahdi Army, and these people are all backed by Iran,” said Captain Hussein Ali of the Scorpion police brigade, one of the Iraqi units drafted in to take part in Operation Omen of Peace.

Yesterday the city's streets - unpaved, dirt tracks between grubby, low brick houses - were crawling with Iraqi security forces. Soldiers searched houses as police manned checkpoints and Soviet-era tanks guarded bridges over the Tigris River.

The flood of troops, who had moved into position outside the city a week ago, had encountered no resistance as they moved in yesterday. The leaders of the Shia militias that once ruled as crime bosses and warlords were either gone or in hiding. Even the police chief fled a week ago, fearing arrest for his affiliation to al-Mahdi Army, while the mayor, a member of the Sadrist movement, was arrested.

Outside one of the long-neglected police bases built by the British Army, scores crowded to sign up as police officers, the only regular job in a city whose main industry is weapons smuggling from nearby Iran, but a profession that until now was closed to most.

“In the past, you needed contacts with the tribal sheikhs or to pay three million dinars in bribes to get a job as a policeman,” said Raed Mijbil, 30. “All the Iraqi security forces were corrupt.”

Nouri al-Maliki, the Shia Prime Minister, has insisted that his large-scale operations in the south are not targeting the Sadrist movement, which has been increasingly weakened by internal divisions, its brutal reputation for murder and extortion, and a more confident Iraqi military. Hojatoleslam Moqtada al-Sadr, the fundamentalist Shia cleric who heads the al-Mahdi Army and the Sadrist political movement, ordered his men not to resist the government forces, and a senior member of his parliamentary block expressed grudging support.

“We stand with the Government on imposing the law and we are showing goodwill,” said Bahaa al-Araji, a member of the Sadrist parliamentary bloc. “But law must be imposed on everybody. We hope the target of the plan is not our movement.”
"Please don't kill us!"
Locals said that militiamen had been spotted throwing their weapons into the Tigris or trying to hide them along the lush river banks. One man said that he saw two women digging up a stash hidden by a fighter and taking them into a weapons collection point in the hope of a reward.
Private enterprise in action ...
The ease with which Iraqi forces retook al-Amarah, for long a no-go zone, was in marked contrast to the battle for Basra launched by Mr al-Maliki in March. That conflict ended only when the Government cut a deal with Hojatoleslam al-Sadr, a ceasefire brokered by Iran.

“This way is better,” said Captain Ali, noting that an army battalion would stay in al-Amarah once the operation is finished clearing out the militias. “We don't want to lose people, and in urban warfare women and children can get killed.”

While the Prime Minister had personally to lead his shaky forces on the offensive in Basra, he and his army have gained in confidence since establishing control of the southern port city, even flooding the Sadr City stronghold in Baghdad with thousands of soldiers. For the first time in years the young cleric looks unsure of himself. Last week he announced that the main wing of al-Mahdi Army would devote itself to civilian projects, while a streamlined, smaller group would carry on attacking the US military, whom the demagogue deems a legitimate target for resistance.

Nabil Ibrahim, 20, an al-Amarah resident, was pleased to see the influx of government troops but upset that the men who had turned his city into a lawless no man's land had escaped. “The leaders who escaped aren't all al-Mahdi Army, they are Iranian intelligence agents. We are sad because they got away and they'll be back.”

Captain Ali denied that the criminal leaders had been allowed to get away. “We didn't just let them escape, this was a kind of amnesty. This was a last chance for those who were misled by the militias and regretted it,” he said. He said that the local population was co-operating with the security sweep, and that the army had found more than 900 roadside bombs in weapons stashes.
A fair number of the 'criminal leaders' will re-integrate into society. You don't need to kill them, you just need to show them that the old days are over.
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Iraq
Iraqi officer denies US role in 'Sadr peace process'
2008-05-21
(KUNA) -- The US has nothing to do with the "peace process", which began in al-Sadr City last night, an Iraqi officer said here Tuesday. The "peace process" was prepared before a relevant agreement was reached between al-Sadr trend and a delegation of the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA), Major General Qassem Atta, spokesman for the Baghdad Operations Command, told a news briefing.

Iraqi security forces managed to remove 100 explosives in the first stage of the process without any casualty, he said. Iraqi troops have deployed in al-Sadr city in order to thwart violence in the outlying city in eastern Baghdad, he added. The process is being carried out in collaboration with al-Sadr trend in light of the agreement signed by the UIA in a bid to prevent bloodshed in the city, he said.

Speaking to Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) earlier in the day, Atta said the "peace process" had already begun to search for illegal weapons. Under the process, citizens shall undertake that they have no illegal weapons, while gunmen shall give up their illegal weapons in return for money, he noted. He quoted Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki as instructing an ad hoc committee led by the minister of refugees to cater for people in al-Sadr city and pay compensations to the affected people over Iraqi military operations in the city.

On March 25, Al-Sadr was the scene of a joint US-Iraqi military operation that claimed the lives of some 100 al-Mahdi Army militants and Iraqi and US soldiers against the backdrop of recent Basra operations. The United Iraqi Alliance and al-Sadr trend have recently reached a government-blessed deal that could reduce skirmishes in al-Sadr city.
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Iraq
The men in black vanish and Basra comes to life - How can this be?
2008-04-25
Young women are daring to wear jeans, soldiers listen to pop music on their mobile phones and bands are performing at wedding parties again.

All across Iraq’s second city life is improving, a month after Iraqi troops began a surprise crackdown on the black-clad gangs who were allowed to flourish under the British military. The gunmen’s reign had enforced a strict set of religious codes.

Yet after three years of being terrified of kidnap, rape and murder – a fate that befell scores of other women – Nadyia Ahmed, 22, is among those enjoying a sense of normality, happy for the first time to attend her science course at Basra University. “I now have the university life that I heard of at high school before the war and always dreamt about,” she told The Times. “It was a nightmare because of these militiamen. I only attended class three days a week but now I look forward to going every day.”

She also no longer has to wear a headscarf. Under the strict Islamic rules imposed by the militias, women had to cover their hair, could not wear jeans or bright clothes and were strictly forbidden from sitting next to male colleagues on pain of death. “All these men in black [who imposed the laws] just vanished from the university after this operation,” said Ms Ahmed. “Things have completely changed over the past week.”

In a sign of the good mood, celebratory gunfire erupted around Basra two nights ago and text messages were pinged from one mobile phone to another after an alleged senior militia leader was arrested.

Raids are continuing in a few remaining strongholds but the Iraqi commander in charge of the unprecedented operation is confident that his forces will soon achieve something that the British military could not – a city free from rogue gunmen.

British and US officials acknowledge tentatively that a turning point has been reached. Sir Richard Dannatt, the head of the British Army, made an unannounced visit to Basra over the weekend.

Local people are daring to hope that the dark days of death squads and kidnap are over, displaying the sort of optimism that was last seen when British forces arrived in 2003 with the false promise of a better life free from Saddam Hussein.

Driving through Basra in a convoy with the Iraqi general leading the Charge of the Knights operation, The Times passed Iraqi security forces manning checkpoints and patrolling the roads. Not a hostile shot was fired as the convoy turned into what was until the weekend the most notorious neighbourhood in the city. Hayaniya, a teeming slum, was a bastion for al-Mahdi Army, the main militia.

For the first time in four years local residents have been emboldened to stand up to the militants and are turning in caches of weapons. Army checkpoints have been erected across Basra and traffic police are also out in force.

The security forces have also torn down many banners supporting al-Mahdi Army as well as portraits of its leader, Moqtada al-Sadr, though some still remain in militia strongholds.

The contrast could not be more stark with the last time The Times visited Basra in December, when intimidation was rife.

Many blame the British for allowing the militias to grow. “If they sent competent Iraqi troops to Basra in the early stages it would have limited the damage that happened in our city,” said Hameed Hashim, 39, who works for the South Oil Company.

Lieutenant-General Mohan al-Furaiji, Basra’s outgoing commander, said that his goal was “to turn Basra into a safe city without any armed groups” within two months. Local authorities would then have to improve the standard of living for the people of Basra, a city of 2.5 million, where raw sewage runs down the streets and the unemployment rate is as high as 80 per cent, despite countless projects funded by the British Government.

“The army has achieved security . . . but people can’t just live with peace. This is a miserable city by all measures,” said General Furaiji, speaking at the Basra Operations Centre on the bank of the Shatt al-Arab waterway. “We have given nothing to the people. Peace is vital but people can’t eat or drink peace,” he told The Times. Despite being an Iraqi-led operation, British and American soldiers are also embedded at the Shatt al-Arab Hotel, providing advice and expertise. Hundreds of British and American troops are on the ground alongside the Iraqis and coalition aircraft fly overhead.

Keen to demonstrate the new-found security, General Furaiji stopped his Humvee on the main street of largely boarded-up stores in Hayaniyah and ducked into a dilapidated coffee shop for a glass of Iraqi tea and a bread roll.

A cluster of young men ventured forward to speak to him, voicing concern about finding work rather than security fears. Ahmed Nassir Kassim, 23, said: “Before there were killings. Now it’s better. I would like the Government to look after the people and provide us with jobs.”

The neighbouring district of al-Qibla was similarly calm. Hussein Fadhil, a professional musician, runs a shop in the centre of the city that rents out musical instruments and has seven bands that he hires for weddings.

Musicians suffered greatly. Many were forced by the militia to abandon their trade or beaten up if they tried to perform. Weddings were affected, with couples being told not to play music. “Just two weeks ago if you passed a wedding party you would not be able to tell whether it was a wake or a wedding,” Mr Fadhil, 44, said. The tide has turned, however. Eleven band members who quit because of intimidation want their old jobs back and are receiving bookings for at least one party a day.

In a new sweep that began yesterday, seven Iraqi battalions entered a market area – one of three remaining militia bastions – where they found four large hauls of munitions. In the past month Iraqi troops have killed dozens of fighters, made 400 arrests and lost 12 soldiers. At the same time, it is thought that about 60 militia leaders have escaped across the border into Iran or are lying low outside Basra, working out their next move.

The British military expressed cautious optimism at the progress. Major Tom Holloway, a spokesman, said: “The Iraqi security forces have made a real difference; this is going to be a long operation by its nature. However, rule of law is returning to the streets.”
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Iraq
British accused of appeasing Shia militia in Basra
2008-04-12
In Basra the signs of the feared militia are slowly receding. For the first time in years alcohol vendors are selling beer close to army checkpoints, and ringtones praising the rebel cleric Hojatoleslam Moqtada al-Sadr are vanishing from mobile phones. Music shops are once again selling pop tunes instead of the recorded lectures of Shia ayatollahs.

But, as the city cautiously comes back to life after an offensive by Iraqi troops backed by hundreds of US soldiers, there is a lingering resentment towards the British Army.

Many here blame the British for allowing the al-Mahdi Army and other militias to impose a long reign of terror on the once cosmopolitan city.

The battle for Basra is still not over. An American airstrike yesterday killed another six men who had been attacking Iraqi troops from the militia's hold-out areas, which the Army has so far been unable to penetrate.

Support is, though, slowly building for Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi Prime Minister, who led his troops into Basra having given his US allies barely more than a weekend's notice of the impending attack. The British were informed only a day before, prompting Lieutenant-General Peter Wall, the deputy chief of staff, to describe the whole operation as “hastily planned”.

“After the Iraqi Army set up checkpoints and the militia disappeared from the streets, I decided to start selling alcohol,” Luay Hanna, a 46-year-old liquor store owner, said. His shop was burnt down by fundamentalist militiamen three years ago, and many of his colleagues were butchered.

“Many of the alcohol sellers reopened their shops. We always sell near the Iraqi army checkpoints to be safe - not like before when the militia killed and kidnapped people right in front of the police's eyes.”

Qaldoon Nuri, who runs a CD shop, was forced to stop selling pop songs for fear of the zealous gunmen four years ago. One of his friends was murdered for refusing to heed the ban. He was forced to sell religious songs, many of them praising al-Sadr, as well as lectures on tenets of the Shia faith.

“The militia forced us to follow a fanatic Islamic code. They forced us to put up pictures of the imams,” he said. “Now after the militias have been defeated by government forces, we started to put some songs on CD and are looking for what's new in the arts - what people actually like.”

One of his neighbours, Saleh Muhammad, has been badgered in his phone shop by customers demanding new pop ringtones and pictures of female singers to download. “I think it's freedom from the fear,” he said.

The British have been unable to bask in even the partial success of the battle. Having abruptly decided to take on the militias after years of appeasing them, Mr al-Maliki's first venture on to the battlefield was plagued by desertions from his security forces and stronger than expected resistance. Outfought, he called on US forces for support rather than the 4,100 British troops who have barely left their base at Basra airfield.

When the British commanding officer visited the Prime Minister's field headquarters during the fight he was left waiting outside by the Iraqi leader. The humiliating snub was believed to be payback for an alleged deal with the militias by British forces, who released several of their jailed leaders and agreed not to attack them if the British base was not hit.

“I think the British troops were the main reason that militias became very powerful,” complained Inas Abed Ali, a teacher. “They didn't fight them properly and, when they found themselves losing in the city, they moved out to the airport and chose to negotiate with the militias and criminal groups as if they were legal.”

“The British Army had no role in Basra,” Rahman Hadi, a coffee shop owner, said. “We haven't seen any achievements by them in the streets of Basra. I don't know why their troops didn't respond to the acts of these militias for long years, after seeing all the suffering that Basra people went through.”

Even senior Iraqi officers admitted that the hands-off British approach to policing the city had given the militias free rein. Brigadier Alaa al-Ittabi, from the infantry command of the Iraqi Ministry of Defence, said that the British Army “was sometimes negatively lenient, like the way they dealt with the militias”. Mr Hadi was placing his hopes on the new Iraqi forces. “The presence of these foreign troops adds nothing to the situation, and even the Iraqi troops trained by the British Army proved to be infiltrated by the militias and to be corrupt.”

General David Petraeus, the US commander here, said that the Iraqi Army's initial performance in Basra had been disappointing and gave warning that the battle could last months. Brigadier al-Ittabi attributed the mass desertions at the outset to the deployment of local forces who were unwilling to fight their neighbours and whose families were vulnerable to militia threats.

Sources in Basra said that the Iraqi troops started to gain traction only after Mr al-Maliki drafted in two extra brigades, one from the Sunni city of Ramadi and the other from Karbala, where the al-Mahdi Army's rival militia, the Badr Brigades - loyal to the main Shia party in Mr al-Maliki's Government - holds sway.

Some observers have described the battle in Basra, which has also sparked fighting in the al-Mahdi Army's main stronghold of Sadr City in Baghdad, as a power struggle between the anti-US Sadrists, with strong grassroots support among poor Shia, and the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, which runs the Badr militia and has long co-operated with the US military.

That theory was lent weight yesterday when unidentified gunmen shot down Hojatoleslam al-Sadr's brother- in-law, who ran his office in the Shia holy city of Najaf, where the Badr forces are strong.
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Iraq
Al-Mahdi army offers to lay down its arms
2008-04-08
Iraq’s largest and most dangerous militia will voluntarily disband if Shia scholars advise its leader to do so, officials said yesterday — a dramatic move that could quell much of the fighting in the war-torn country.

Aides to Hojatoleslam Moqtada al-Sadr said that he would send delegations to Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a moderate religious leader in Najaf, and to senior clerics in Iran to consult on whether he should stand down his 60,000-strong al-Mahdi Army.

The sudden announcement — the first time that the rebellious cleric had offered to disband his forces — came as US and Iraqi troops were poised for a key offensive into his Baghdad stronghold of Sadr City.

Yesterday streams of refugees were pouring out of Sadr City as automatic gunfire and mortar bomb blasts ripped through the giant slum that is home to 2.5 million people. Terrified residents scuttled down side streets as tanks trundled along the main thoroughfares, shooting at guerrillas. A massive American and Iraqi security presence had ringed the area, with police and soldiers guarding every exit with many predicting a final, bloody showdown as popular support drained from al-Mahdi Army.

The position of Hojatoleslam al-Sadr, whose fighters fought government forces to a standstill in Basra, was looking precarious. His former erstwhile ally Nouri al-Maliki, the Shia Prime Minister who personally led the Basra crackdown, saw his standing bolstered by his tough approach to the militias.

Despite the inconclusive results of his Basra offensive, Mr al-Maliki has refused to back down and this weekend stitched together a rare consensus of Kurds, Sunnis and Shias to back a law banning from future elections any party that maintains a militia.

That united stance has put the Sadrists on the back foot, and support for the militia was waning even in Sadr City itself as official forces pushed ever deeper into al-Mahdi Army territory.

Ali Nema, a 45-year-old bureaucrat, was pushing his elderly parents and young children out of Sadr City on a wooden market barrow as gunfire rattled a few streets away. “I had to get them out now because almost the whole of my sector has left, more than 80 per cent of the houses are empty now. The Americans are attacking, the Mahdi Army mortars are falling and the Iraqi Army are fighting too,” he said.

Zainab Amer, a student, was stuck in her house for two weeks, too afraid to leave. She fled yesterday after a mortar bomb killed four neighbours. Before she left, four militiamen were shot dead in her street fighting the US Army. “I saw one of them having his hand blown off right in front of our door. It was a horrible sight,” she said. “Everyone is fighting everyone else.”

An Iraqi police commander whose forces have sealed the eastern approaches to Sadr City said that raids would resume today when a government deadline for the militia to disarm expires. “I think this time they’re finished,” said Brigadier Ali Ibrahim Daboun. “In all the previous battles, they were attacking and we were on the defensive. Now it’s the other way round.”

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Iraq
U.S. Armor Forces Join Offensive In Baghdad Against Sadr Militia
2008-03-28
U.S. forces in armored vehicles battled Mahdi Army fighters Thursday in Sadr City, the vast Shiite stronghold in eastern Baghdad, as an offensive to quell party-backed militias entered its third day. Iraqi army and police units appeared to be largely holding to the outskirts of the area as American troops took the lead in the fighting.

Four U.S. Stryker armored vehicles were seen in Sadr City by a Washington Post correspondent, one of them engaging Mahdi Army militiamen with heavy fire. The din of American weapons, along with the Mahdi Army's AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades, was heard through much of the day. U.S. helicopters and drones buzzed overhead.

The clashes suggested that American forces were being drawn more deeply into a broad offensive that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, launched in the southern city of Basra on Tuesday, saying death squads, criminal gangs and rogue militias were the targets. The Mahdi Army of cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, a Shiite rival of Maliki, appeared to have taken the brunt of the attacks; fighting spread to many southern cities and parts of Baghdad.

As President Bush told an Ohio audience that Iraq was returning to "normalcy," administration officials in Washington held meetings to assess what appeared to be a rapidly deteriorating security situation in many parts of the country.

Maliki decided to launch the offensive without consulting his U.S. allies, according to administration officials. With little U.S. presence in the south, and British forces in Basra confined to an air base outside the city, one administration official said that "we can't quite decipher" what is going on. It's a question, he said, of "who's got the best conspiracy" theory about why Maliki decided to act now.

In Basra, three rival Shiite groups have been trying to position themselves, sometimes through force of arms, to dominate recently approved provincial elections.

The U.S. officials, who were not authorized to speak on the record, said that they believe Iran has provided assistance in the past to all three groups -- the Mahdi Army; the Badr Organization of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, Iraq's largest Shiite party; and forces loyal to the Fadhila Party, which holds the Basra governor's seat. But the officials see the current conflict as a purely internal Iraqi dispute.

Some officials have concluded that Maliki himself is firing "the first salvo in upcoming elections," the administration official said.

"His dog in that fight is that he is basically allied with the Badr Corps" against forces loyal to Sadr, the official said. "It's not a pretty picture."

Elements of Sadr's militia have fought fiercely, including rocketing the Green Zone, the huge fortified compound in Baghdad where the U.S. Embassy, Iraqi government offices and international agencies are located.

Starting about 5:25 p.m., the Post reporter heard the launch of 14 rockets, which Mahdi Army officers in the area said were aimed at the Green Zone. U.S. officials reported that 12 rounds hit the zone in that time frame, including six that fell inside the embassy compound. An American civilian contractor was killed in a residential area of the embassy compound, while another death was reported in the zone's U.N. compound.

Several Mahdi Army commanders said they had been fighting U.S. forces for the past three days in Sadr City, engaging Humvees as well as the Strykers. By their account, an Iraqi special forces unit had entered Sadr City from another direction, backed by Americans, but otherwise the fighting had not been with Iraqis.

"If there were no Americans, there would be no fighting," said Abu Mustafa al-Thahabi, 38, a senior Mahdi Army member.

In August, Sadr ordered his militia to observe a cease-fire, a move widely credited with helping to reduce violence across Iraq. In recent days, Sadr officials have said the cease-fire remains in force. But in practice, his fighters and Iraqi and U.S. forces are waging full-scale war in places. Further fighting with his men could slow U.S. troop withdrawals from Iraq.

American commanders said in recent days that their units were taking only a backup role in the offensive and that Iraqi forces were growing strong enough to shoulder the country's security needs.

Maj. Mark Cheadle, a U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad, said he could not make an accurate assessment of what the Post reporter saw without knowing the precise location. He underlined that U.S. troops were playing a backup role in the offensive but that on a battlefield that is "360 degrees," it might seem at times that they were out front. If an Iraqi unit was about to be overwhelmed by an enemy, "of course we are going to assist."

On Thursday, thousands of followers of Sadr turned out for a peaceful demonstration in Baghdad. Iraqi television channels carried crowd scenes in which people carried a coffin draped in flags and decorated with a portrait of Maliki. They denounced him as a "new dictator" and chanted: "Maliki keep your hands off. People do not want you."

Gunmen wearing police commando uniforms stormed the Baghdad home of a well-known member of Maliki's government, Tahseen al-Sheikhli, and took him hostage, according to the Information Ministry. Sheikhli is a chief spokesman for the Baghdad security plan, in charge of building public support for government efforts to quell violence in the city.

As fighting continued in Basra, saboteurs blew up one of the city's main oil pipelines. Gunmen opened fire on the city's police chief, wounding him and killing three of his bodyguards.

Maj. Gen. Abdul Aziz Mohammad, director of military operations at Iraq's Defense Ministry, said the Basra operation would continue until security forces captured the outlaws or wiped them out. He said the Iraqi military planned to seal and search every neighborhood to capture suspected criminals and confiscate weapons.

But an adviser to Iraqi security forces, who had predicted that the fight in Basra would take 10 days, said it could go on much longer. He also said Iraqi forces were calling on U.S. and British forces for help. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he said he was not authorized to speak with reporters.

"I think the government can't win this battle without interference of Americans or British," he said. "I think the aid or assistance is on the way." In his view, the Iraqi military needed air coverage and help with logistics and intelligence.

The fighters "are opening many, many fronts against the army," he said. The adviser said the militia's weapons, some of them made in Iran, are more powerful than those of the Iraqi army.

So far, casualties in Basra on all sides have totaled about 400 killed and 300 wounded, he said.

Maj. Tom Holloway, a British military spokesman, said Iraqi security forces were "consolidating their current positions" and preparing for the next stage of the offensive. They were cordoning off areas and trying to gain control of the city "bite-size chunk by bite-size chunk."

Residents in Basra said they observed Mahdi Army militiamen gathering in their neighborhood stronghold of Jumhuriyah, assembling men and weapons while dodging gunfire from Iraqi army snipers at intersections.
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Iraq
Iraqi police in Basra shed their uniforms, kept their rifles and switched sides
2008-03-28
Abu Iman barely flinched when the Iraqi Government ordered his unit of special police to move against al-Mahdi Army fighters in Basra.

His response, while swift, was not what British and US military trainers who have spent the past five years schooling the Iraqi security forces would have hoped for. He and 15 of his comrades took off their uniforms, kept their government-issued rifles and went over to the other side without a second thought.

Such turncoats are the thread that could unravel the British Army’s policy in southern Iraq. The military hoped that local forces would be able to combat extremists and allow the Army to withdraw gradually from the battle-scarred and untamed oil city that has fallen under the sway of Islamic fundamentalists, oil smugglers and petty tribal warlords. But if the British taught the police to shoot straight, they failed to instil a sense of unwavering loyalty to the State.

“We know the outcome of the fighting in advance because we already defeated the British in the streets of Basra and forced them to withdraw to their base,” Abu Iman told The Times.

Related Links
Basra crisis leaves British withdrawal in ruins
Analysis: Britain must now fight or fail
Iraqi troops take on Shia militia in Basra clash

“If we go back a bit, everyone remembers the fight with the US in Najaf and the damage and defeat we inflicted on them. Do you think the Iraqi Army is better than those armies? We are right and the Government is wrong. [Nouri al] Maliki [the Iraqi Prime Minister] is driving his Government into the ground.”

The reason for his apparent switch of sides was simple: the 36-year-old was already a member of the al-Mahdi Army which, like other militias, has massively infiltrated the British-trained police force in the southern oil city. He claimed that hundreds of others from the 16,000-strong force have also defected to the rebels’ ranks.Abu Iman joined the new Iraqi police force after the invasion, joining the Mugawil, a special police unit infamous for brutality, kidnapping and sectarian murders.

“We already heard two weeks ago that we were going to attack the Mahdi Army, so we were ready,” he said. “I decided to take off my uniform and join my brothers and friends in the Mahdi Army. All these years, we were like a scream in the face of the dictator and the occupation.” He said: “I joined the police because I believed we have to protect Basra and save it with our own hands. You can see we were the first fighters to take on Sadd-am and his regime, the best example being the Shabaniya uprising.”

Abu Iman said that the fighting raging in Basra yesterday was intense because the al-Mahdi Army was operating on its own turf. He was confident that the Shia militia would prevail because its cause was just.

“The Iraqi Army is already defeated from within. They come to Basra with fear in their hearts, knowing they have to fight their brothers, the sons of Iraq, because of an order from Bush and his friends in the Iraq Government. For this reason, all of the battles are going in the Mahdi Army’s favour.”

Major-General Abdelaziz Moham-med Jassim, the director of operations at the Ministry of Defence, played down reports of defections in the Basra police force. “The problem of one policeman doesn’t make up for the whole of the force,” he said.

In recent months Major-General Abdul Jalil Khalaf, Basra’s police chief, has tried to shake up the force and drive out militia infiltrators, who have wrought havoc in the past, often turning police stations into torture cells in which factions settled vendettas and power struggles with murder and abuse. But he only narrowly escaped an assassination attempt yesterday when a suicide car bomb attack in Basra killed three of his policemen. A local tribal leader said the police directorate building was later gutted by fire.

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Iraq
Police arrest tens of militiamen southern Baghdad
2008-03-16
(KUNA) -- Tens of militiamen were arrested on Saturday in the Iraqi city of al-Kout, the largest city in the Wasset Province South of Baghdad, due to reoccurrence of clashes between security forces and militias.

Storming operations to track down militiamen took place throughout the city's neighborhoods, which resulted in the arrests, including 25 suspects on the wanted list, an Iraqi police source told KUNA. Huge amount of weapons and explosives were confiscated during the raids, the source added, yet failed to report the exact number of arrests. Two Iraqi policemen were killed and ten others were injured due to clashes that took place yesterday at the city which borders Iran.

Office of Shiite leader Muqtada Al-Sadr plausibly denied relations with perpetrators of the attacks, describing them as a "group of outlaws". The clashes came few days after the Sadr's al-Mahdi Army militia was waived to defend itself against any attacks executed "exclusively" by coalition forces in Iraq.
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Iraq
Git or die, interpreters for British Army told
2007-09-15
This will make your blood boil. Hat tip Monkey Tennis Center.
Iraqi interpreters working for the British Army have been advised to leave Basra or be killed. The warning was issued by a leading member of the city’s security forces after militiamen attacked and destroyed the home of one interpreter and narrowly failed to kidnap another. There were unconfirmed reports yesterday that a third had been killed.

“All the interpreters have to leave Basra because these militia will never let them rest. They will kill everybody they know [who worked for the British],” Colonel Saleem Agaa Alzabon, who leads Basra’s special forces, said. “The interpreters have to leave. They have no choice.”

Colonel Saleem and the two targeted interpreters told The Times that the militiamen – almost certainly members of the Shia al-Mahdi Army – had stepped up their pursuit of so-called collaborators since the British withdrew from Basra city 11 days ago. The latest attacks are further evidence of the extreme danger that the 91 interpreters for the British military face now, let alone when the troops leave Iraq for good. They will intensify the pressure on Britain to reverse its refusal to grant them asylum. Gordon Brown ordered a review of that policy after The Times highlighted the interpreters’ plight last month.

The target of the first attack was Ahmed, 25, a student who has been working for the British Army for three years, first in a base in the Shatt al-Arab hotel and now at the al-Shaibah base outside Basra, where the Irish Guards are training Iraqi troops. Ahmed (not his real name) said that last Friday his 22-year-old cousin borrowed his car to fetch his sister, who lives near the al-Shaibah base. The cousin used the route Ahmed normally takes to work. He was stopped by four masked men at a makeshift checkpoint and whisked away.

When the kidnappers realised that they had the wrong man they telephoned the cousin’s family to say that he would be killed if Ahmed did not give himself up. The family lied, saying that Ahmed had left Iraq. The kidnappers then demanded a $15,000 (£7,500) ransom. Ahmed handed over all the money that he had saved over three years. The family asked a tribal leader to give it to the kidnappers and bring back the cousin so that they would not be cheated. The cousin returned home with a message for Ahmed: “If we find you anywhere in Basra we will kill you, but if you come to us and give us information we will let you live.”

Ahmed has now sent his wife and one-year-old daughter to a relative’s house far from Basra and intends to stay on the al-Shaibah base. He said that if the Government did not grant him asylum in Britain he would have to seek refuge in another country. “I’m very frightened,” he said. “The militias know all the interpreters in Basra. They waited for the British to leave so they could attack us . . . If the British don’t give me asylum I will have big problems because if I stay in Iraq I will be killed.”

A British officer, who declined to be named, confirmed Ahmed’s identity, and saw no reason to doubt his story. “It would not be the first time something like this has happened,” he said.

The second attack came late on Sunday night. Mohammed Motlag, who has worked as an interpreter since 2003, told The Times that he was working at the British base at Basra airport when his wife telephoned to say their house was being attacked by about 40 militiamen. They were shouting: “We have come to kill your husband. He’s a spy for the British forces.”

Mr Motlag, 46, said that his two children, aged 6 and 3, were also in the house. He could hear the militiamen trying to break down the door. Weeping at his helplessness, he told his wife to get his gun and start firing. He then called Colonel Saleem, an old friend, who rushed a police detachment to rescue the family. The militiamen later blew up the house with grenades. Mr Motlag said that his family were now in hiding. Colonel Saleem corroborated Mohammed’s story when contacted by The Times. “That's right,” he said, and then repeated it himself.

The Ministry of Defence said it was aware of the interpreters’ claims, took the safety of its Iraqi employees very seriously, and was reviewing the assistance it provides to them. It continued: “The total number of Iraqis who have worked for us since 2003 with a claim to assistance could be at least 15,000. We therefore need to consider the options carefully.”

Senior politicians, diplomats and army officers have urged the Government to grant the interpreters asylum. The Times has learnt that the Government privately accepts that it has a moral obligation to help them, but ministers are still debating how many of the thousands of other Iraqis – and their dependents – who have assisted the British should be allowed in.
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Iraq
Bill Roggio - Operation Phantom Thunder: The Battle of Iraq
2007-06-22
A status update on the operations in the Baghdad Belts and beyond

Operation Phantom Thunder, the name of the overarching operation to secure the Baghdad Belts, is now in its fifth day. As noted yesterday, Phantom Thunder is a corps level operation, with multiple U.S. and Iraqi divisions engaged on multiple fronts. Iraqi Security Forces and Multinational Forces Iraq are engaged in intense fights in four main theaters: Baghdad proper, and the belts regions consisting of Diyala and southern Salahadin province to the north, northern Bail province to the south, and eastern Anbar province to the west of Baghdad. The fighting has been the most intense in the city of Baqubah, the provincial capital of Diyala.

The concurrent operations in each theater have been named in most cases. Operation Arrowhead Ripper, managed by Multinational Division North is underway in Baqubah and greater Diyala province. Multinational Division Central is running two operations: Operation Marne Torch southwest of Baghdad and Operation Commando Eagle to the southeast. The current operation in eastern Anbar, managed by Multinational Forces West has not yet been named. Operation Fardh al-Qanoon (Otherwise known as the Baghdad Security Plan), which officially kicked off in mid February, is managed by Multinational Division Baghdad and the Iraqi Baghdad Operational Command.

Operation Arrowhead Ripper

The large portion of the media attention has focused on the battle in Baqubah, as this is where the brunt of the heavy fighting is occurring. Baqubah is the provincial capital of Diyala as well as al Qaeda's proclaimed capital of its rump Islamic State of Iraq. Hundreds, and upwards of 1,000 al Qaeda fighters are believed to be holed up in the city in prepared fighting positions. The city has been mined with IEDs and booby trapped homes, and seeded with snipers.

Michael Gordon reported troops moving into western Baqubah, where al Qaeda is holed up, found well prepared medical aid stations and field hospitals. "The hospital, uncovered by troops from the Fifth Battalion, 20th Infantry, was equipped with oxygen tanks, defibrillators, generators and surgical equipment, as well as pieces of insurgent propaganda," noted Mr. Gordon. Baqubah and greater Diyala province is al Qaeda country.

"At least 41 insurgents have been killed, five weapons caches have been discovered, 25 improvised explosive devices have been destroyed and five booby-trapped houses have been discovered and destroyed," Multinational Forces Iraq reported last evening.

The 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team of the 2nd Infantry Division (3/2) appears to be shouldering the brunt of the combat. The soldiers from the 3/2 "killed 24-36 enemy fighters and detained nine," according to Mike Gilbert of the News Tribune. "They found and destroyed 16 other roadside bombs, four houses that had been rigged to explode, and two car bombs. They found two safe houses, destroyed what he described as a mobile weapons cache, and captured two other weapons caches, including 'a significant IED cache.'"

Both Michael Gordon and Michael Yon, who are embedded in Baqubah, reported U.S. and Iraqi troops are receiving valuable intelligence from the resident of Baqubah. "A positive indicator on the 19th and the 20th is that most local people apparently are happy that al Qaeda is being trapped and killed," Michael Yon noted. "Civilians are pointing out IEDs and enemy fighters, so that’s not working so well for al Qaeda."

While the reporting from the regions outside Baqubah is sparse, there are indications engagements are also ongoing in the Diyala River valley.

Operations Marne Torch and Commando Eagle

Multinational Division Central, the newly created command to deal with the southern Baghdad Belts, has two concurrent major operations ongoing in its area of operations. Marne Torch is focusing on the city and surrounding regions of Arab Jabour, which is southeast of Baghdad. Commando Eagle is focusing on the Mahmudiyah region southwest of Baghdad.

"To date, Marne Torch and Iraqi army units have detained more than five dozen suspected extremists and destroyed more than 17 boats on the Tigris River that are responsible for transporting accelerants into Baghdad," Multinational Forces Iraq reported in a press release. "U.S. forces killed five insurgents, discovered and destroyed 12 improvised explosive devices, and detained 13 wanted individuals."

Operation Commando Eagle began on June 21, and was described as a " mix of helicopter-borne air assaults and Humvee-mounted movements, included Soldiers from several battalions of the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) out of Fort Drum, N.Y., and the 4th Brigade, 6th Iraqi Army Division."

The operation has yielded 29 suspected insurgents and numerous weapons caches, including one containing "75 CDs of propaganda and terror techniques instructing methods to commit kidnappings and to shoot down coalition helicopters."

The Mahmudiyah region contains the notorious "Triangle of Death," an area where al Qaeda and Sunni insurgents have established bases of operations to attack Baghdad and launch attacks on the Shia areas to the south. Three U.S. soldiers were captured in the region in mid May, and two of the soldiers are still missing.

Operation ??? in eastern Anbar

Multinational Forces West has yet to release the name of the ongoing operations in eastern Anbar province. But the scope of the operation in eastern Anbar is now clearer. In an Associated Press interview with Brigadier General John Allen, the deputy commander of Multinational Forces West, the hot spots in the province were identified.

Brig. Gen. Allen noted there are three main focal points: Fallujah, Karma and the Thar Thar region. The Fallujah piece includes moving into each of the 11 neighborhoods of the city and "establishing very quickly neighborhood watch organizations and a police precinct headquarters." [See The Fourth Rail's interview with Colonel Richard Simcock, the commanding officer of Regimental Combat Team - 6 for more details on the operation to clear Fallujah].

The operation to secure the Fallujah neighborhoods is called Alljah. "The operation is similar to what another unit did in the city of Ramadi,” said Maj. George S. Benson, executive officer of 2nd Battalion, 6th Marines “We’re capitalizing on the success of Ramadi and using many of the same techniques.”

Fallujah is expected to be fully secured by August. U.S. forces expect to clear Karma, the poisonous al Qaeda haven northeast of Fallujah, and the Thar Thar region by July. "We're going to clear Karma here very shortly," Brig Gen Allen told the Associated Press, as he described the town as a "way station" to and from Baghdad. "We're going to start churning up the ground north on the grounds of Thar Thar ... a spot where we haven't had forces before."

Captain Eric Coulson, a the commanding officer of a Army Engineer company in the Fallujah Ramadi corridor and author of Badgers Forward described the situation in eastern Anbar in an interview today. "Al Karma continues to be the most challenging area in Multinational Forces West's area of operations, followed by Zaidon. Karma is the one place we can be guaranteed to find IEDs every night."

Captain Coulson also noted the improved security situation in Fallujah and the Habbaniyah and Amiriyah regions. "Fallujah gets better by the day," he noted. "Most of the area west of the river seems to be stable. There are lots of tribes and Iraqi Police providing local security in the Habbaniyah and Amiriayh/Ferris areas. The truth is it is very quite."

Battling the Mahdi Army; raiding al Qaeda

As the major offensive is ongoing in the belts, the pressure is being kept up on Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army as well as al Qaeda's network throughout Iraq.

Iraqi Special Forces raided Sadr City and captured a “key insurgent leader” on June 20, along with two associates. “This individual is allegedly responsible for coordinating and conducting kidnappings, death squad killings and improvised explosive device attacks against innocent civilians and Iraqi and Coalition Forces,” noted Multinational Forces Iraq. “The primary suspect is allegedly responsible for supplying vehicles, identification materials, and uniforms to support insurgent activities such as the kidnappings and extra-judicial killing of Iraqi citizens. He is also alleged to have received new technologies to upgrade improvised explosive devices that would be used to target Iraqi and Coalition Forces.”

This comes as General David Petraeus announced that an “Iran-backed” secret cell of Mahdi Army was behind the kidnapping of five British civilians in Baghdad last May. “We think that it is the same network that killed our soldiers in Karbala in an operation back in January,” General Petraeus told The Times. “We killed the head of that network less than a week before the operation that detained those British civilians. It was already planned and carried out by his followers. It is a secret cell of Jaish al-Mahdi [al-Mahdi Army] not all of which are under control of Moqtada al-Sadr.” General Petraeus is referring to the Iranian backed Qazali Network, which the U.S. has been actively working to dismantle.

The operations against al Qaeda’s nationwide network also continue. Raids on Wednesday and Thursday in Mosul, Karma, Fallujah and “north of Baghdad” netted 11 al Qaeda. Coalition forces have positively identified an al Qaeda leader from the Karma region who was killed on June 17. “Hussayn Awath Hussayn Hawawi, also known as Abu Thabbit, was a Libyan foreign fighter with connections to the North African foreign fighter network and ties to al-Qaeda in Iraq… Intelligence reports indicate he moved at least 30 North African fighters into Iraq” after escaping during a prison break in Mosul in March. “Hawawi is also believed to be involved in suicide bombing operations, and his foreign fighters allegedly conducted a number of attacks on Coalition Forces in Anbar province in late May.”

The concurrent operations in the Baghdad Belts, combined with the effort to secure Baghdad and the Special Forces raids on al Qaeda’s network will place a great strain on the terror group if the momentum is carried through the summer. Iraqi and Coalition forces are striking hard in the heart of al Qaeda and Sunni insurgent havens in Diyala, Babil and Anbar while squeezing the terror groups in the capital and conducting intelligence driven raids to keep the enemy off balance.

Al Qaeda can chose to stand and fight, and may do so in some places. But will eventually attempt to flee the hot zones in central Iraq for safer grounds. This will push them further from Iraq’s center of gravity, while placing them at risk while attempting to reestablish their networks. Northwestern Iraq – Niwena, Salahadin and Kirkuk will be a likely destination, however some of the most experienced Iraqi Army units are operating in the region. Some of them are taking up blocking positions to prevent the infiltration of terrorists attempting to escape Operation Phantom Fury.

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Iraq
Curfew imposed on Amara city in Iraq
2006-10-24
(KUNA) -- Iraqi security authorities on Monday imposed a curfew on al-Amara city, south of Baghdad, the Ministry of Defense said. Spokesman for the Ministry Mohamed al-Askari said the curfew was imposed on people and vehicles in al-Amara, a major city of south Iraq Mesan Province. He attributed that the curfew was imposed sine die owing to the deteriorating security situation in the city.

Earlier on Monday, unknown militants killed an Iraqi police officer while he was leaving his house in central Amara City, which has recently seen strict security measures following the assassination of a high-ranking Iraqi police officer there, eyewitnesses said. The eyewitnesses told the Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) here that unidentified gunmen on a white Toyota shot dead Iraqi first lieutenant Sarmad Maguid Al-Shati while he was leaving his house in the Sector 28 in downtown al-Emara City early Monday, before they fled the scene.

The Iraqi police officer was killed a few hours after the corpse of the brother of Muqtada Al-Sadr's al-Mahdi Army commander was found in al-Emara. Awda al-Bahrani, spokesman for Muqtada al-Sadr's office in al-Emara confirmed the report in a news briefing, saying that the beheaded policeman Mohamed al-Bahdali, brother of al-Mahdi Army commander in the province Fadel al-Bahdali, was kidnapped by militants following the assassination of the Criminal Intelligence chief in Mesan last Wednesday.

Earlier last week, Amara was the scene of clashes between Shiite militias and Iraqi policemen following the assassination of Iraqi police colonel Ali Qassem al-Tamimi and arrest of several members of al-Mahdi Army.
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