US prepare to hand Fallujah to ex-Saddam general

US marines performed an abrupt U-turn today and prepared to hand the siege city of Fallujah over to an Iraqi army led by one of Saddam Hussein’s top generals.

The move was made on a day when ten more US soldiers were killed in Iraq - bringing the month’s death toll to 126.

After the tentative deal was announced in Fallujah, marines and guerrillas skirmished, with blasts and sporadic gunfire heard from the northern part of the Sunni city.

The Fallujah agreement, which was still being finalised tonight, came after intense international pressure on the United States to find a peaceful solution to the stand-off that killed hundreds of Iraqis in the Sunni city.

It had become a symbol of anti-US resistance in Iraq, fuelling violence that made April the deadliest month for US forces.

Only last week, US commanders threatened to launch an all-out attack on the city to root out an estimated 1,500 Sunni insurgents inside.

Even after Washington decided to push ahead with political efforts instead, marines and guerrillas continued to clash, with the heavy US bombardment of the city the past two nights televised around the world.

Marines encircled the city of 200,000 on April 5, following the killings and mutilations of four American contract workers.

In addition to the hundreds of Iraqis killed, at least eight Marines died in the fighting, although a full US casualty count from the battle has not been released.

Marines on the south side of the city began packing up gear in preparation to withdraw and breaking down the earth wall they had built to help encircle the city.

The Fallujah agreement was negotiated between US forces and city representatives, including four Iraqi generals.

The deal provides for a new force, known as the Fallujah Protective Army, to enter the city tomorrow and provide security.

It will consist of up to 1,100 Iraqi soldiers led by a former general from Saddam’s military, said marine Lieutenant Colonel Brennan Byrne, adding that finer points were still being negotiated.

Marine forces will gradually pull back from their positions in and around Fallujah, to allow FPA forces to take positions enforcing the cordon of the city and move into some neighbourhoods on Friday, Byrne said.

He called the deal “an Iraqi solution to an Iraqi problem.”

Byrne identified the commander only as General Salah, a former division commander under Saddam.

He did not know the general’s full name. But a Lieutenant General Salah Abboud al-Jabouri, a native of the Fallujah region, served as governor of Anbar province under Saddam and was a senior commander in Saddam’s military.

Many of the guerrillas in Fallujah are believed to be former members of Saddam’s regime or military.

The forces will “have certain advantages that we don’t,” Byrne said. “One, they’re Iraqis. Two, they’re local. So, they know the populace, they know the terrain.”

It seems likely that some of the insurgent gunmen in the city would likely end up as part of the force, said a marine officer.

Inside the city, some residents breathed a sigh of relief.

“I will be so happy today. I’m hoping for a quiet night without bombs or explosions,” said Hassan al-Halbousi, a resident in his 60’s who spent the entire siege alone in his house after sending his family to Baghdad soon after it began.

“I can’t believe what we have gone through,” he said. ”The bombing has terrified me. No one is in the streets …. Even the dogs in the city were hunting us because they had no food.”

US troops at the main checkpoint in and out of Fallujah opened fire on a car today, killing several Iraqis, although there were differing accounts of the circumstances of the attack.

Elsewhere, eight US soldiers from the 1st Armored Division were killed by a bomb near the town of Mahmoudiyah, south of Baghdad. Four soldiers were wounded.

In eastern Baghdad, a soldier from the Texas-based 1st Cavalry Division was killed by an attack on his patrol, the military said.

Another US soldier was killed and another wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their convoy outside Baqoubah.

The American deaths raised to 126 the number of troops killed in combat in April, the bloodiest month for US forces in Iraq.

At least 736 American troops have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003. Up to 1,200 Iraqis also have been killed this month.

Seven Iraqi police and a civilian were killed today in attacks in the northern city of Mosul.

A South African civilian was shot dead in his car in the British controlled southern city of Basra.

Three members of an Iraqi family were killed when a rocket hit a residential building in the northern town of Beiji.