Sadr forces warned of imminent attack

REBEL forces inside the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf were warned yesterday they have “hours to surrender” or face attack from US and Iraqi forces.

“The decisive hours are near,” said Iraqi defence minister Hazem Shaalan.

Meanwhile, in Baghdad, assassins bombed the convoys of two Iraqi cabinet ministers in separate attacks that killed five bodyguards but left the officials unharmed. The al-Qaida-linked militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s Tawhid and Jihad group claimed responsibility for one attack.

Addressing Iraqi National Guard troops in Najaf, Mr Shaalan said Iraqi troops were working to cordon off the Imam Ali shrine.

The defence minister said guardsmen would use loudspeakers to urge the followers of firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to evacuate the shrine and surrender.

“When your brothers approach the holy shrine compound, they will direct calls of mercy to those (militants) to surrender,” he said. “They have hours to surrender.”

Mr Shaalan said if al-Sadr surrendered, “he will be safe and will be highly respected. But if he continues to resist, then there will be no options for him other than death or prison”.

Meanwhile, US helicopter gunships and Bradley fighting vehicles were attacking militant positions in downtown Najaf. Militants returned fire with mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.

US Army Lieutenant Chris Kent, whose unit was about 300 yards from the shrine, said troops backed by air strikes were continuing to fight militants near the holy site.

The insurgents, who previously were fighting throughout the Old City and a nearby sprawling cemetery, appeared to be centred around the shrine.

Witnesses said Iraqi forces accompanied US troops into the Old City for the first time in recent days and were stationed about 200 yards from the shrine.

Iraqi officials have said any raid on the shrine would be conducted by Iraqi forces. The presence of US troops would infuriate the nation’s Shi’ite majority.

Both assassination attempts against the government ministers took place in Baghdad.

A car bomb exploded in the southern neighbourhood of Qadisiyah as the environment minister, Miskhat Moumin, was passing through, ministry spokeswoman Dalal Ali said. Four bodyguards were reported killed along with a suicide bomber.

The Tawhid and Jihad group claimed responsibility in a statement posted on an Islamic website.

The second attack, a roadside bomb targeting education minister Sami Mudhafar, happened about the same time in the western Baghdad district of al-Khadra. The blast killed one bodyguard.

Italian journalist Enzo Baldoni, who has been missing from Najaf since last week, is being held by militants, according to a video broadcast yesterday on Al-Jazeera TV.

The militant group, calling itself The Islamic Army in Iraq, did not threaten Mr Baldoni directly, but said in a statement it could not guarantee his safety unless Italy announced within 48 hours that it would withdraw its soldiers from Iraq.

Italy insisted it would keep its troops in Iraq.