Sadrists Strike Deal to End Fighting

Alalam reports:

BAGHDAD, May 10--The movement of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said Saturday it had reached an agreement with Iraqi officials to end weeks of fighting in Baghdad.

Sheikh Salah al-Obeidi, the spokesman for the cleric's office in the central shrine city of Najaf, said the deal reached with a government delegation would be effective from Sunday.

"This agreement will be executed from tomorrow. The Sadr movement has agreed to the contents of the deal and it has now become an official document," he said.

The Sadrist official said the two sides had reached agreement on "10 of the 14 points discussed," which did not include disbanding of Sadr's Mahdi Army fighters.

He took part in the negotiations leading to the clinching of the deal in Baghdad.

Security and medical officials said on Saturday US troops killed 25 Iraqis in the past two days in the Baghdad slum Sadr City.

A medical source at the Al-Sadr hospital said those killed were all men while there were women and children among the wounded.

Hospitals in Sadr City said they had received 13 bodies and treated 77 wounded by Saturday morning, but gave no further casualty figures after that.

They said the US military used airstrikes and tanks to attack the slum.

In one operation, US troops killed 11 Iraqis after they came under attack by unknown gunmen.

Since March 25, US and Iraqi forces have been battling gunmen in Sadr City. Hundreds of people have died.

The Sadr movement had defied calls to lay down arms, saying it needs its weapons for self-defense until other groups nurtured by the US military and the Baghdad government are also disarmed.

Aid workers have warned of a looming humanitarian crisis in Sadr City, home to 2 million people.

Moqtada al-Sadr's followers see the raids as an attempt by the US government to sideline the cleric's mass movement before local elections in October.

Sadr threatened last month to scrap a truce he imposed on his Mehdi Army in August.

Iran Demands Halt to US Attacks on Iraqis

TEHRAN (FNA)- A senior member of Iran's negotiating team with the United States on Iraqi security demanded a halt to US attacks in Iraq before any new round of talks with Washington.


"If US savage attacks against the Iraqi people are stopped, we will examine the US request for a fourth round of talks," an Iranian official told FNA.

"The Iraqi government and the United States have officially invited Iran for the fourth round," the official, who asked to remain anonymous, said.

"Under the current circumstances and given the US widespread attacks against Iraqi people in different cities, Iran does not feel these negotiations are necessary."

Iran and the United States held three rounds of talks on Iraq last year despite mounting tensions over Tehran's nuclear program.

US ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker and his Iranian counterpart Hassan Kazemi Qomi held face-to-face talks in May and July 2007, in the highest level public contact between the two sides for 27 years.

Officials from the two countries also met at the experts' level last August.

The talks have been stalled since the third round.

An Iranian delegation travelled to Baghdad in March expecting a new round of talks which never took place. Iran said the United States cancelled the talks at the last minute.

Yet, the United States in early April said it had informed the Iraqi government it was now prepared to resume the long-delayed talks with Iran.

Tehran, which strongly opposes the US military presence in Iraq, has been repeatedly accused by Washington of interfering in Iraq's affairs.

Iran, whose ties with Washington have been severed since 1980, strongly denies the allegations.

The US is also at loggerheads with Iran over the independent and home-grown nature of Tehran's nuclear technology, which gives the Islamic Republic the potential to turn into a world power and a role model for other third-world countries. Washington has laid much pressure on Iran to make it give up the most sensitive and advanced part of the technology, which is uranium enrichment, a process used for producing nuclear fuel for power plants.

Washington's push for additional UN penalties contradicted the recent report by 16 US intelligence bodies that endorsed the civilian nature of Iran's programs. Following the US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) and similar reports by the IAEA head - one in November and the other one in February - which praised Iran's truthfulness about key aspects of its past nuclear activities and announced settlement of outstanding issues with Tehran, any effort to impose further sanctions on Iran seemed to be completely irrational.

The February report by the UN nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, praised Iran's cooperation in clearing up all of the past questions over its nuclear program, vindicating Iran's nuclear program and leaving no justification for any new UN sanctions.

Tehran says it wants to enrich uranium merely for civilian purposes, including generation of electricity, a claim substantiated by the NIE and IAEA reports.

Iran has also insisted that it would continue enriching uranium because it needs to provide fuel to a 300-megawatt light-water reactor it is building in the southwestern town of Darkhoveyn as well as its first nuclear power plant in the southern port city of Bushehr.

Not only many Iranian officials, including President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but also many other world nations have called the UN Security Council pressures on Tehran unjustified, especially in the wake of recent IAEA reports saying Iran had increased cooperation with the agency and answered all outstanding issues.

US President George W. Bush finished a tour of the Middle East in winter to gain the consensus of his Arab allies to unite against Iran.

But hosting officials of the regional nations dismissed Bush's allegations, describing Tehran as a good friend of their countries.

Bush's attempt to rally international pressure against Iran has lost steam due to the growing international vigilance, specially following the latest IAEA and US intelligence reports.

Behind the scene of the Sadr City crackdown

A Press TV exclusive interview with Sheikh Salah Obeidi, Sadr's official spokesman

The following is the transcript of an Interview with Sheikh Salih al-Obaidi, Moqtada al-Sadr's spokesman:

Q. A meeting was held on Monday between the Sadr Party and President Talabani to discuss the ongoing violence in Baghdad's Sadr city. Clashes have been ensuing between Iraqi and US-led forces and armed groups including members of the Mahdi Army for a month. Would you please tell if during the meeting yesterday there were any new proposals laid out that my lead to the establishment of peace in Sadr City?

A. The meeting with President Talabani was according to a proposal suggested by the parliament. A committee from the parliament visited Sadr City three days ago and they became informed about the miserable situation of the city, the sufferings of the people and the American snipers. So the parliament decided to draw up a proposal to president so that he can set up a meeting between the Sadrists and government to solve the ongoing problem. The meeting should [have] been comprised of the Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki and three presidential office members as well as the parliament speaker and a committee or a league from Sadr office, and some others from Sadr group in the parliament highlighted the current problems in Sadr city. To hold the meeting an official procedure had to be followed. The proposal had to be submitted to President Talabani through the parliament speaker.

Q. Prime Minister Nouri-Al Maliki has set up conditions for the Sadr movement in order to stop the ongoing military operation inside Sadr City including dismantling the Mahdi Army. Does the Sadr party have any plan to consider or accept any of these conditions?

A. We really didn't reach to that point to discuss those conditions to see if we can accept or refuse them. However, we reject Maliki's attitude towards the issue for setting up the conditions for us. Maliki has used a dictator style to put these conditions, because he thinks that the government can do anything to anyone and has official rights to do what it likes to do and no one can question the government's actions. This style, we think, is a dictator style. Furthermore the Maliki has adopted another policy which we refuse to follow that is when he sets conditions, then the Sadrists are obliged to accept those conditions. This indicates that the Sadrists have not followed or refused to accept those points before. He has to set conditions to stop military operation while in reality we have already followed and practiced the things he wanted us to do and we have been very cooperative to reach a kind of peace inside the Iraqi society. The security measures which were implemented since last year have been far from reality in 2006. Security was restored earlier when Sadrists froze their military actions in the first six months of the year, but Maliki ignores these points, trying to say that the Sadrists have done nothing for the security of Iraq. The Sadr movement has done its best.

Q. Has any negotiations taken place between the Sadr movement and the Maliki government?

A. There have been channels and kinds of attempts in order to quell the tensions, but such attempts have not been practical and we have achieved no results. Our problem with the government is the lack of trust. We need guarantees from the government to take our ideas into consideration. We really hope that the new meeting with President Talabani would build trust among us.

Q.What is the significance of the timing of this military operation both in Basra and Sadr city?

A.We really think some political sources provoked or pushed Maliki to do this campaign against our people. We think he has two important political reasons to do this campaign. Firstly, the upcoming elections in October which is very important because it determines who will control the governors and popular Sadr movement is [a source of concern for them], so they try to weaken the movement and impose limitation on it so that it can not participate in the elections. Secondly, there is a future agreement between the US and Iraqi government over the economic and security future of Iraq. We think that the new agreement would a more aggressive occupation. The Sadr party may be the first party to refuse the accord. This has put great pressure on the Sadr movement.

Q. Since Moqtada al-Sadr's ceasefire has entered its eighth months and with respect to Sadr's recent statement which warned of an open war, have the majority of the followers been thinking about the ceasefire. How long will the ceasefire last if the raids and attacks on Sadr's supporters continue?

A. the ceasefire was a decision by Moqtada al-Sadr and the average of the obedient reacted well as Moqtada al-Sadr himself told in an interview with Aljazeera TV. However we can't avoid protecting ourselves at the time of aggressions by the US occupiers or some Iraqi troops who take part in US operations against our people. So they have the right to protect themselves. The ceasefire and freezing Mahdi Army actions would be more practical if both sides don't target the Sadrists. They have to stop the campaign against the Sadr movement. Yes, they have the right to fight the gangs and criminals, but they use the title of gangs and criminals to fight Sadr's supporters. It is not obvious for the observers that Sadrists are the targets of the occupation forces and Iraqi government for political reasons.

Q. Prime Minister Maliki has recently announced that the United Iraqi Alliance cabinet is complete with a notable exception of the Sadr party. Why has the Sadr party chosen to stand back from this particular political process?

A. We decided not to participate in the government to insist our position as opposition to the government. This does not mean that we intimidate the government. We gave Maliki the opportunity to choose professionals for six ministries, but we saw that he did not choose professional people. He chose people who belong to this or that party and four ministries have been without ministers by now. So we concentrate on our opposition to the government and occupiers in order to have a free space for movement against them.

Q. What is the latest on the ground in Basra? We are hearing reports now that the whole area is under the control of the Iraqi army and western media are telling us that is a great success. In late March resistance fighters including Mahdi Army did went into a serious war with Iraqi, US and British forces. So what is exactly the situation now, as it is so quiet, have the fighters simply laid down their arms or they continue raids and attacks?

A. Our people are obedient to the agreement to stop all tension in Basra which happened at the end of March and they have not violated it so far, despite the fact that the Iraqi government and troops have violated the agreement. Moqtada al-Sadr made the decision to stop all tension in Basra in order to give opportunity to the government to fight criminals and gangs, but the government has used the media claiming that it has fought with Sadrists and Mahdi Army and has managed to control the situation. These are totally lies, because our people stopped fighting after the end of March and they obeyed the decision of Moqtada al-Sadr. The Iraqi government and security troops have launched several aggressive actions against our people, for instance the house of three important figures of our office in Basra came under attack and their families were arrested several times for one or two days. They have also prevented us from performing Friday prayers in two or three places in Basra for two weeks without any reasons. What kind of obstacles do the prayers put ahead of security process there? This is an aggressive action. They also destroyed the places and tents that we have built for the prayers in two important places in Basra. So we are now under security forces' attacks in Basra, but the government refuses to accept it, telling media that it has achieved a big victory. The victory has been achieved because we provided them with the opportunity. We have also suffered from being targeted by killers. Some of our people have been killed by gangs in Basra before Maliki's actions and two days ago one of senior figures in Basra office was killed when he was going around with his family. So we have been targeted until now in Basra.

Sadr City is being "Gazatized", turning it into yet another Imperial Gulag

We all now that Gaza was, until now, the biggest open air prison in the world, a Gulag for Palestinians, so to speak. Now the Empire is in the process of "Gazatizing" (as in "Gitmoize Abu Ghraib") and creating an even bigger (3'000'000+ people!) Gulag for Iraqis.

Check out Pepe Escobar's report for Real News Network:




One needs to remember that the Empire just suffered a rather humiliating defeat in the battle of Basra. As Clinton had done after failing in Kosovo, and just as Olmert did after having his "elite" forces defeated by Hezbollah, Bush is now making the civilians pay for their support for the Sadrists.

It is also quite apparent that the Zio-Americans have learned their lesson from the Hamas election debacle and that they have no intention of allowing the Sadrist to participate in the next elections. So in this sense, the upcoming Iraqi elections are also being Gazatized.

So there we have it. The Israelis have taught their American puppets well: Gaza has become the nightmarish "model home" for the many Gulags in which the Empire intends to house all those who dare oppose it.

Who Is Iraq's "Firebrand Cleric"?

(thanks to Ayaz for this contribution!)


By Justin Elliott for Mother Jones (via Truthout)

From Baghdad, veteran Middle East correspondent Patrick Cockburn explains why Muqtada al-Sadr is no maverick.

"Interview in Baghdad," "Interview in Najaf," "Interview in Basra," "Interview in Amara": The endnotes at the back of Middle East correspondent Patrick Cockburn's new book read like an atlas of Iraq. Such is the depth of reporting in Cockburn's Muqtada: Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia Revival, and the Struggle for Iraq, a political biography-cum-war chronicle due out April 8.

As the U.K. Independent's correspondent, Cockburn has spent about half of the last five years reporting, unembedded, around Iraq, a country he's been visiting since 1977. His subject is the real Iraq, and Iraqi voices predominate in his work. British and American officials rarely appear in the book. (He assiduously avoids the U.S. military's Green Zone press briefings.) When Cockburn does give airtime to the official line, he's usually debunking it. It was this irreverent attitude that got him barred from entering Iraq in the late 1990s when the regime was displeased with Out of the Ashes: The Resurrection of Saddam Hussein, a collection of Iraq reportage focusing on the aftermath of the Gulf War, which Cockburn wrote with his brother. In Muqtada Cockburn both explores the rise of al-Sadr, undoubtedly one of the most important men in Iraq today, and traces the disintegration of Iraq through five years of American occupation.

After several failed attempts, I reached Cockburn by phone at the Al-Hamra Hotel in Baghdad March 17, just before the start of the recent fighting in Basra. In between broken connections and over the loud whir of a military helicopter above the hotel, I asked him what al-Sadr's role will be in the future Iraq and if, on the fifth anniversary of the invasion, he sees any reason for hope.

Mother Jones: In the beginning of your book, you write that Muqtada al-Sadr leads "the only mass movement in Iraqi politics." Can you elaborate on that, especially given that in the American media we still hear more about the official Iraqi government than some of these other factions?

Patrick Cockburn: It's always sort of amazing, sitting here in Baghdad, to watch visiting dignitaries-today we had Dick Cheney and John McCain-being received in the Green Zone by politicians who have usually very little support and seldom go outside the Green Zone. Muqtada leads the only real mass movement in Iraq. It's a mass movement of the Shia, who are 60 percent of the population, and of poor Shia-and most Shia are poor. Otherwise the place is full of sort of self-declared leaders, many of whom spend most of their time outside Iraq. You know, if you want to meet a lot of Iraqi leaders, the best places are the hotels in Amman or in London. In general the government here is amazingly unpopular.

MJ: What are the roots of his credibility among the people?

PC: Muqtada belongs to the most famous religious family in Iraq, which is the al-Sadr family. He's really the third in line. [Muqtada's father] drew his power from the first really important al-Sadr, Muhammad Baqir, who was executed by Saddam in 1980, together with his sister. So it's really a family of martyrs, and that's why Muqtada suddenly emerged from nowhere with the fall of Saddam. If you had passed around a picture of him in Washington at the time of the overthrow of Saddam, I doubt if any of them would have heard of Muqtada.

MJ: Did anyone outside or inside the country predict Muqtada's rise?

PC: No, absolutely not. His father was dead along with two of his brothers, assassinated by Saddam in 1999. His father-in-law had been executed. He was under sort of house arrest in Najaf and was just within inches of getting executed himself. So everybody-those who knew the family history-thought that the whole organization had been destroyed. What Muqtada had going for him was that he had been a senior lieutenant of his father, so he had street experience of politics from the 1990s. Also he had a sort of core of people who revered him who were politically experienced, and he brought this together very fast just in the days after the fall of Saddam.

His father was a very interesting character because he's almost the only person who persuaded Saddam to trust him. Saddam thought it would be a really smart political move after the great Shia uprising of 1991 if he could have his own Shia religious leader who'd be in his pocket. So he chose this guy, Muqtada's father, who came from the right family. Muqtada's father used this to promote a mass movement. And then at the last movement Saddam discovered he had been fostering this extremely dangerous enemy, who was refusing to use Saddam's name when he called for prayers, so Saddam had him murdered in Najaf.

MJ: Is the Western media epithet for Muqtada as the "firebrand cleric" accurate?

PC: The idea that he's a maverick is 100 percent contrary to his track record over the last five years. In fact he's very cautious, never pushing things too far, trying not to be pushed into a corner. [L. Paul] Jerry Bremer tried to arrest Muqtada and ignited a tremendous uprising over most of southern Iraq in 2004. You could see all these Americans in the Green Zone had completely failed to realize the kind of support he could get. They announced they were going to arrest him and suddenly the whole of southern Iraq erupted and Bremer [couldn't] control it anymore-but Muqtada did. Then there was a big siege of Najaf. But Muqtada always sort of looked for a way out. So the idea of him as a maverick cleric, a firebrand, is one of these absurd journalistic clichés that takes on a life of its own, despite the fact that its contradicted by everything that happens.

MJ: Another thing you see is journalists frequently describing him as a "radical cleric." Is there anything radical about al-Sadr?

PC: Well, it's slightly more accurate. He's radical in the sense that he wants the U.S. occupation to end and has always said so from the beginning. Secondly, his support among the Shia really runs along class lines; it's mainly the poor who support him. His organization runs an enormous social network. Despite the fact that there's billions of dollars sitting in the Iraqi government reserves, somehow they are incapable of getting it out to the people. There are a very large number of people here who are on the edge of starvation. For those sort of people-a sizable chunk of people-that service makes them regard Muqtada as a sort of god.

Another thing is that he's always been able to call on a core of young men. Young Shia who have been brought up with nothing, who are pretty anarchic, pretty dangerous. My book begins with a run-in I had with them in 2004 when they came close to killing me, and of course they have killed very large numbers of other Iraqis. That's a major source of strength for Muqtada.

MJ: You write that from the U.S. perspective, Muqtada looks too much like a younger version of Ayatollah Khomeini. Is there anything to that?

PC: There's an element of truth to it. But from the moment George Bush decided to overthrow Saddam, the people who were going to benefit here were the Shia, who are 60 percent of the population. So if you were ever going to have an election, then the Shia would take over. An awful lot of the American problems in Iraq over the last five years come from the U.S. thinking that in some way it can devise a formula here that Saddam would be gone and the Shia religious parties-guys who look a bit like Khomeini, not just Muqtada, but all the other clergy-wouldn't take over. The U.S. never found it. I don't think it's there.

MJ: So if the Democrats win the election in the United States, and they make good on their promise to pull out or mostly pull out from Iraq, what role would al-Sadr play in that scenario?

PC: A very critical role. Here is sort of the biggest Shia leader with the most popular support. If there were elections tomorrow he would probably sweep Shia Baghdad and most of the south. He's not going to take over the whole of Iraq because Iraq is such a divided place these days. The Kurds are never going to let the Arabs take over their chunk, and the Sunni are going to fight like tigers to keep the Shia from taking over their areas.

MJ: What would an Iraq under al-Sadr look like?

PC: I don't think the whole of Iraq would be under al-Sadr, but I think he would be the predominant force on the Shia side. Quite contrary to his sort of maverick, firebrand image, he's shown a propensity to deal with the other side, to look for compromises, to negotiate. You might have a loose federation [in Iraq]. There are some things that could hold it together, notably oil revenues. But at the moment, the much vaunted surge has had a measure of success primarily, to my mind, because Sunni and Shia Iraqis hate and fear each other more these days than they hate and fear the Americans.

MJ: You write in the book that the U.S. as well as Iraqi politicians habitually fail to recognize the extent to which hostility to the occupation drives Iraqi politics. How much of al-Sadr's popularity do you ascribe to him speaking against the occupation?

PC: I was doing a lot of interviews today with ordinary Iraqis, and they all bring it up, the question of the American occupation. The latest opinion polls show that seven out of ten Iraqis want foreign forces to leave Iraq, and most want them to leave now. One of the problems of the Iraqi government sitting in the Green Zone [is that] being associated with the occupation taints them and reduces their authority. Lots of people you talk to here, particularly Sunni, don't just say "the government," they say "the traitor government." In some ways this is extremely simple and obvious. There are very few countries in the world that welcome being occupied. And it's sort of strange that this very obvious fact-which has probably been a critical fact for why the U.S. is in such trouble here-has never really penetrated Washington.

MJ: In your piece marking the fifth anniversary of the invasion, you describe Iraq as "a collection of hostile Sunni and Shia ghettoes divided by high concrete walls." That's a pretty grim picture. Do you see any reason for optimism on the horizon?

PC: Well, not greatly. Because it seems to me that all the things that have led to the violence are still there. The current situation reminds me of the war in Lebanon, which went on really from the mid-70s to 1990. You had periods where there was kind of an unstable balance of power. Baghdad has the same feeling at the moment. Sunni and Shia aren't coming together; they don't go into each other's areas. The Sunni-Shia dispute, the Arab-Kurd dispute, the Iraqi-American dispute-none of these things are resolved and any of them could ignite at any moment, and almost certainly will.

One of the problems with the media covering this place is that there are stereotypes of news, one of which is "war rages" and the other is "peace dawns." And there isn't much in between. When I talk to foreign journalists, often they are gritting their teeth because they've been asked for a piece about how shops are reopening and restaurants are reopening and so forth-happy pieces. And it just ain't so.

Justin Elliott is an editorial fellow at Mother Jones

Iranian General Played Key Role in Brokering Iraq Cease-Fire

by Leila Fadel for McClatchy Newspapers

Iraqi lawmakers traveled to the Iranian holy city of Qom over the weekend to win the support of the commander of Iran's Qods brigades in persuading Shiite cleric Muqtada al Sadr to order his followers to stop military operations, members of the Iraqi parliament said.

Sadr ordered the halt on Sunday, and his Mahdi Army militia heeded the order in Baghdad, where the Iraqi government announced it would lift a 24-hour curfew starting early Monday in most parts of the capital.

But fighting continued in the oil hub of Basra, where a six-day-old government offensive against Shiite militias has had only limited gains.

So far, 488 people have been killed and more than 900 wounded in the offensive, Iraqi Interior Ministry officials said.

The backdrop to Sadr's dramatic statement was a secret trip Friday by Iraqi lawmakers to Qom, Iran's holy city and headquarters for the Iranian clergy who run the country.

There the Iraqi lawmakers held talks with Brig. Gen. Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Qods (Jerusalem) brigades of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps and signed an agreement with Sadr, which formed the basis of his statement Sunday, members of parliament said.

Ali al Adeeb, a member of Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki's Dawa party, and Hadi al Ameri, the head of the Badr Organization, the military wing of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, had two aims, lawmakers said: to ask Sadr to stand down his militia and to ask Iranian officials to stop supplying weapons to Shiite militants in Iraq.

"The statement issued today by (Muqtada al Sadr) is a result of the meetings," said Jalal al-Din al Saghir, a leading member of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. "The government didn't have any disagreement with the Sadrists when it went to the city of Basra. The Sadrist movement is the one that chose to face the government."

"We asked Iranian officials to help us persuade him that we were not cracking down on the Sadr group," said an Iraqi official, who asked for anonymity due to the sensitivity of the subject.

He described the talks as successful but said hard-line Sadrists could goad the government into over-reacting and convince Sadr that the true aim of the Iraqi Security Forces is to destroy the Sadrists.

"I will not be surprised if the whole thing collapses," he said.

In addition to Sadr, who is in Qom pursuing religious studies, Iraqi lawmakers met Suleimani, said Osama al Nejafi, a legislator on the parliamentary committee formed to solve the Basra crisis.

"An agreement was signed," Nejafi said, referring to Sadr. "Iran was part of the problem and an effective part of the negotiations."

Sadr issued a nine-point statement Sunday saying he would renounce anyone who carried arms against the government and government forces. The statement also asked the government to halt all raids against the Mahdi army, end detentions of militia members who had not been charged and implement the general amnesty law.

To preserve the "unity" of Iraq Sadr called for an end to "all armed manifestations in Basra and in all provinces."

The Qom discussions may or may not bring an end to the fighting but they almost certainly have undermined Maliki - who made repeated declarations that there would be no negotiations and that he would treat as outlaws those who did not turn in their weapons for cash. The blow to his own credibility was worsened by the fact that members of his own party had helped organize the Iran initiative.

"The delegation was from the United Iraqi Alliance (dominated by the Dawa party and the Supreme Council of Iraq), and the Prime Minister was only informed. It was a political maneuver by us," said Haider al Abadi, a legislator from Maliki's Dawa party. "We had evidence (that Muqtada and Iranian-backed militants were fighting security forces) and we sent people urgently...If we had been waiting for one year in Baghdad we wouldn't have had this result." The delegation is expected to return to Iraq Monday.

Maliki welcomed Sadr's statement as a positive development, said his advisor Sadiq al Rikabi. Anyone who abandons weapons and goes home would not be pursued, he said, adding that the offensive would continue against a list specific targets, but he would not give details, Maliki -- who had said he would not leave Basra until the Shiite militias were defeated -- was expected to remain in Basra for a few more days, he said.

Following Sadr's announcement a curfew was lifted in most of the capital, while the Sadr controlled areas of Sadr City, New Baghdad and Kadhemiya remained under 24-hour lockdown. The U.S. military still surrounded the Shiite slum of Sadr City, named for Sadr's father and a stronghold of support for Sadr. It was still unclear what the effect the statement had Sunday night.

In another blow to Maliki, his security advisor, Saleem Qassim al Taee, known as Abu Laith Al-Kadhimi, was killed in the fighting in Basra. The Dawa party member had lived in exile under Saddam's regime for 20 years.

"With great sorrow the prime minister's office mourns one of its employees," it said in a statement. "(He) was killed by a treacherous shell during his national duty which was launched by criminal hands who are stained by crime and killing."

In Basra Mahdi Army militants fought to keep their strongholds but were overrun by Iraqi Security Force in the eastern neighborhood of Tanuma. U.S. and British aircraft conducted four air strikes in the city, the U.S. military said. In downtown Basra in the area of al Timimiyah Iraqi forces surrounded the neighborhood as coalition aircraft struck Sunday morning, residents said.

But the Iraqi security forces still couldn't penetrate the vast Shiite slum of Hayaniyah or al Qibla, two Mahdi Army stronghold of Basra.

Following Sadr's statement both the Sadr office in Basra and Sadr City said that their fighters would obey the orders and go home. But militants on the ground in Basra said they would continue to fight in self-defense.

"We will stay in our positions because the government didn't stop the raids and the attacks against the Mahdi Army and their areas," Abu Muamal said. "We are waiting for clear orders from our command and we will not withdraw until the situation is clarified."

McClatchy Special Correspondents Ali al Basri contributed from Basra, Qassim Zein from Najaf and Laith Hammoudi from Baghdad.

Update on developments in Iraq

Sadr Fighters Withdraw from Baghdad, Basra Streets

Muslim Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has ordered his Mahdi Army fighters on Monday to withdraw from the streets in a move signaling the end of clashes which erupted in the southern port city of Basra and quickly spread to areas across Iraq.

The Sadr group in Baghdad confirmed that fighters from Mahdi Army were no longer deployed in the capital. "Sadr movement and Jaish al-Mahdi (Mahdi Army) are committed to the order of Sadr," said Hamdallah al-Rikabi, spokesman of the cleric's movement in western Baghdad.

"But we are ready, should the Americans come inside our district, to fight. We have enough IEDs (improvised explosive devices) for them. If they come, we will defend ourselves", Haider al-Asadi, a fighter from the Mahdi Army, said. Asadi added that the US troops were on the edge of the neighborhood and had "deployed snipers on the rooftops of houses."

Witnesses said pedestrians and vehicles were now on the streets of the two cities after curfews were eased. "Life is back to normal in Sadr City," said Ahmed Suhail, a resident of the eastern Baghdad district and bastion of Sadr where intense fighting killed dozens of people. Authorities lifted the curfew across Baghdad but still retained it in the Baghdad districts of Sadr City, Kadhimiyah and Shuala amid continuing tensions.

At the meantime, a volley of rockets smashed into Baghdad's fortified Green Zone on Monday hitting at least five people, including an Iraqi army major and two US soldiers, a witness said. The rockets struck near a checkpoint in the complex, which is the seat of the Iraqi government and home to most foreign embassies, said Muhanned al-Dulaimi, who counts himself lucky to have survived the attack. There was no immediate confirmation of the attack from the US embassy.


Mortars hit 5 in Baghdad Green Zone

At least five people have been hit by a volley of six mortars which smashed into Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, the police say.

The rockets struck near a checkpoint in the complex, which houses Iraq's government and the US Embassy, said Muhanned al-Dulaimi who witnessed the event on Monday.

"The rockets hit the ground near the checkpoint. The sirens were sounding. I saw five people lying on the ground. Two of them were American soldiers, two were civilians and one was an Iraqi army major," he explained.

Al-Dulaimi was unable to determine whether the casualties were dead or wounded.

The Green Zone has come under intense mortar and rocket attack over the past week as Mahdi Army fighters have battled Iraqi and US security forces in the capital and in southern Iraq.


MP Hails Sadr Ceasefire Order

NAJAF, Iraq, March 31--An Iraqi parliamentarian hails Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's order to demilitarize its loyalists to bring a halt to the military clashes extended in southern Iraqi city of Basar.

In an interview with Alalam, Legha Ale Yasin said that in case of no military or political interference by occupier forces, more agreements could be settled to bring an extensive peace and security in the region.

"Yet Sadr movement has fulfilled its entire obligation in demilitarizing its fighters. So it expects the government to bring an end to its random raids targeting his loyalists," she said.

The official also urged the US-led forces to stop their raids against Iraqi settlements as well as public utilities during which hundreds of civilians have lost their lives.

"The government is obliged to prevent occupiers' more military incursions too, because Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, as a supreme commander of the armed forces, is the sole person who should accept responsibility of any further Iraqi bloodshed," she added.

Al-Sadr ordered his Mahdi Army militia to stop fighting government forces and urged them to cooperate to stop "Iraqi bloodshed" and "achieve security."

The cleric called on the government to apply the general amnesty law, end random raids targeting his loyalists and release detainees.

Shops and markets were opening and vehicles could be seen amid a big troop deployment in the oil-rich city.

Estimates of the death toll since the outbreak of violence vary. As many as 250 people died and over 500 were injured in Basra, according to medical sources.