Moqtada Al Sadr warns US: I am ready to face martyrdom

[General Duke]

Rebel leader warns US: I am ready to face martyrdom

By Patrick Cockburn in Baghdad

17 April 2004

 

 

Muqtada Sadr, the Shia cleric whom the US army is trying to arrest, warned yesterday that negotiations to end the stand-off in Najaf were near collapse.

 

Sadr, wearing a white shroud to show he is willing to face death, appeared in the mosque of the nearby town of Kufa showing that the US encirclement of Najaf is less than complete. He said: "I am ready to face martyrdom."

 

His spokesman, Sheikh Fuad al-Tarafi, said: "I believe that the mediation will not continue for long. There are no results from these negotiations and [they] could collapse." The US has been demanding that Sadr be arrested and his Army of the Mehdi disbanded, something he says he will not do.

 

At the same time Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the most influential Shia cleric, warned in a sermon yesterday that he regards US troops entering the holy cities of Najaf or Kerbala as a "red line" which must not be crossed. Quite what Ayatollah Sistani would do if the 2,500 US troops outside Najaf launched an attack is not clear but there is no doubt that Iraq's Shia would resist if asked.

 

Meanwhile, US military and civilian officials yesterday met with leaders from Fallujah, the first known direct negotiations between Americans and city representatives since the siege began 12 days ago.

 

Richard Jones, the civilian head of the US delegation said the United States agreed to move its soldiers so residents of Fallujah would have direct access to the city's main hospital and both sides agreed to continue dialogue.

 

Until now, US-allied Iraqi leaders have been involved in talks to find an end to the violence. The Americans are expected to push the Fallujah leaders to have insurgents abide by the ceasefire. US officials, however, were not certain what influence the leaders have with the gunmen. But fighting continued. A US F-16 warplane dropped a 2,000-pound (900kg) bomb in northern Fallujah yesterday, destroying a building where gunmen had been seen, marines said. F-16s later returned for more strikes on buildings believed to be housing rebels. Meanwhile, Lebanon's top Shia Muslim cleric yesterday warned that attempts by US forces to attack holy Shia cities in Iraq or kill Sadr would increase violence against Americans across the Islamic world.

 

Grand Ayatollah Sheik Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah also called on US forces to end their siege of Fallujah, saying it contradicted America's promise to establish democracy in Iraq after Saddam Hussein.

 

"We reject talk about killing or capturing Muqtada Sadr," Ayatollah Fadlallah told thousands of worshippers in his weekly sermon at a Beirut mosque. "We want the wounded Iraqi people, who are facing killings and destruction, to solidify their stance in order to establish a new free Iraq administered by their will and not by the will of the occupation." The holiest Shia site - the Imam Ali shrine in Najaf - is only metres away from the office where Sadr, a fiery anti-American cleric, is holed up, surrounded by gunmen. The remarks by Ayatollah Fadlallah and Ayatollah Sistani's representative came as diplomatic efforts were intensified to end a standoff between US troops and Sadr in the holy city. Some 2,500 US troops are ringing Najaf as they prepare for a final showdown with Sadr's militia, the Mehdi Army. US commanders have vowed to "kill or capture" him after his militia launched a bloody uprising last week taking control of a number of cities.

 

US forces were also surrounding Fallujah, after fierce fighting left hundreds of Iraqis and 88 US soldiers dead, the deadliest month so far for the Americans. Fallujah is a stronghold of anti-American militants in overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim central Iraq.

 

Ayatollah Fadlallah, 69, strongly opposed Saddam Hussein's regime and the US-led war against Iraq. A harsh critic of US policies in the region, he is respected among Shia in the Arab world and is the top religious authority for Lebanon's 1.2 million Shia. His rank of grand ayatollah is the highest a Shia cleric can attain.

 

One optimistic sign was a call from the mosques for police and paramilitary Iraqi Civil Defence Corps to return to duty. A Canadian and three Czech hostages were released yesterday but a Danish businessman was reported kidnapped in Basra.