Al-Sadr backs down in face of imminent attack

REBEL Shi’ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr backed down last night in the face of a looming Iraqi army assault on a holy shrine in Najaf where his gunmen have been holding out.

As the army was preparing for its offensive, al-Sadr suddenly accepted a peace plan to end the fighting in Najaf. However, al-Sadr wanted to negotiate how the deal would be implemented, said his spokesman Sheik Hassan al-Athari.

The cleric’s decision came just hours after Iraqi Defence Minister Hazem Shaalan said the government could raid the revered Imam Ali shrine to evict the militants.

He said Iraqi forces were fully trained to oust militants from the shrine, and US forces would not enter the compound.

The peace agreement could spell the end of the two-week resurgence of violence in Najaf that enraged many of the country’s majority Shi’ites and posed the greatest test yet for the fledgling government of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.

The ceasefire deal was presented to al-Sadr’s aides in Najaf on Tuesday by an eight-man delegation sent by the Iraqi National Conference. Al-Sadr declined to meet with the mediators personally.

The proposal demanded the cleric’s militia drop its arms, withdraw from the shrine and transform itself into a political party in exchange for amnesty.

Sheik Hassan al-Athari, an official at al-Sadr’s office in Baghdad, said the cleric had agreed to the plan, but wanted the delegation to return to Najaf to negotiate how it would be implemented and to ensure his militants will not be arrested. He said al-Sadr had other, more minor conditions.

A previous ceasefire with Al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia that ended a spring uprising two months ago collapsed two weeks ago into street battles throughout the city.

Clashes marked by gunfire and explosions continued in Najaf even after the agreement was announced. Fighting in the city has killed six people and wounded 23 others since Tuesday morning.

The US military has said the fighting in Najaf has killed hundreds of militants, though the militants deny the claim. Eight American soldiers and at least 40 Iraqi police have also been killed.

The fighting in Najaf cast a pall over the conference in Baghdad, which had been intended to project an image of amity and inclusiveness on the road to democracy.

State Minister Qassim Dawoud had earlier said a Government raid on the shrine would send a message to insurgents throughout the country.

“This will be a civilised lesson for those in Fallujah, Samarra, Mosul, Yusufiyah or Basra. There is no lenience with those people,” he said.

However, last night, Safiya al-Suhail, an independent Shiite delegate at the conference, said she had received a letter from al-Sadr’s Baghdad office saying he was agreeing to the conference’s peace plan.

“We call on the Iraqi government and the National Conference to participate in implementing what is proposed by Muqtada al-Sadr, otherwise everybody will bear the responsibility,” the letter said.