Allawi visits war-torn city

Iraq’s interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi made an unannounced visit to the war-torn city of Najaf today, calling on militants to lay down their weapons after days of fierce clashes with US forces.

“We think that those armed should leave the holy sites and the (Imam Ali Shrine compound) as well as leave their weapons and abide by the law,” Allawi said before a meeting with Najaf’s governor.

Najaf was ravaged by fierce fighting on Thursday and Friday between US forces and radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia that left scores dead.

The Mahdi Army controls the Imam Ali Shrine compound, one of the most revered sites in Shiite Islam, where the remains of Imam Ali, son-in-law and cousin of the Islam’s 7th century prophet, are buried.

The Najaf fighting has threatened to revive a Shiite uprising that broke out in April and was calmed only in a series of truces in June.

The military says hundreds of militants have been killed in the latest violence, though the militiamen put the number far lower.