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Sadr fighters lay down their weapons
Published: May 15, 2008 at 10:44 PM
BAGHDAD, May 15 (UPI) -- Forces loyal to Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr laid down their weapons Thursday as reports emerged from Iraq of relative calm in the Baghdad district of Sadr City. -
U.S. claims Iranian weapons are in Iraq
Published: May 15, 2008 at 10:42 PM
BAGHDAD, May 15 (UPI) -- A spokesman for the U.S. military in Baghdad said emerging evidence suggests Iran is backing the so-called special groups targeting coalition and Iraqi forces. -
Sadrists' political future uncertain
Published: May 15, 2008 at 10:40 PM
BAGHDAD, May 15 (UPI) -- The Sadrist Movement emerged as an influential force in the post-Saddam era in Iraq, but its potency may be in decline, analysts say.
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Analysis: Indian agencies start blame game
Published: May 15, 2008 at 8:36 PM
By KUSHAL JEENA
UPI Correspondent
NEW DELHI, May 15 (UPI) -- India's intelligence and security agencies are indulging in a blame game over a recent foiled infiltration bid by militants on the Pakistani border, with one agency accusing the paramilitary forces guarding the border of lacking alertness. -
Iraq press roundup
Published: May 15, 2008 at 7:20 PM
By HIBA DAWOOD
UPI Correspondent
The daily Al Mashriq newspaper had an editorial Thursday titled "Last lines for the chaotic months" that said although Iraq has been in a war for five years, the government in the last few weeks has been chaotically carrying out quick military operations and offensives in many cities and areas around the country. -
Features: More graves found
Published: May 15, 2008 at 2:31 PM
By RICHARD TOMKINS
ZAHAMM, Iraq, May 13 (UPI) -- The number of human remains unearthed in an al-Qaida killing field northeast of Baghdad in Diyala province is nearing 70 with the discovery of more graves by villagers who had volunteered to search an abandoned pomegranate orchard. -
Analysis: USAF's cyber offense capability
Published: May 15, 2008 at 2:23 PM
By SHAUN WATERMAN
UPI Homeland and National Security Editor
WASHINGTON, May 15 (UPI) -- Procurement documents from the U.S. Air Force give a rare glimpse into the Pentagon's plans for developing an offensive cyberwar capacity that can infiltrate, steal data from and if necessary take down enemy information technology networks. -
Iraq Press Roundup
Published: May 14, 2008 at 3:49 PM
By HIBA DAWOOD
UPI Correspondent
The Association of Muslim Scholars' Al Basaer newspaper said in its editorial Wednesday that President Bush has divided the people of Iraq into five groups according to the five political groups in Iraq. -
Feature: Iraq's killing fields
Published: May 14, 2008 at 2:13 PM
By RICHARD TOMKINS
ZAHAMM, Iraq, May 13 (UPI) -- Farmers digging in part of an abandoned pomegranate orchard in the Diyala provincial village of Zahamm have uncovered the graves of more than 50 people murdered by al-Qaida-Iraq during their two-year reign of terror in the area.
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Feature: Renewed calm in Sadr City
Published: April 28, 2008 at 4:00 PM
UPI Correspondent
BAGHDAD, April 28 (UPI) -- Violent clashes in Baghdad's Sadr City between gunmen of the Mehdi Army and U.S. forces and Iraqi Security Forces appears to have dampened, allowing U.S. and Iraqi Army troops to continue outreach efforts in the southern reaches of the volatile district while continuing to mop up Mehdi Army elements.
Despite occasional outbursts of small-arms fire and the explosions from improvised explosive devices planted by Shiite militiamen, doctors from the 4th Brigade, 11th Iraqi Army on Wednesday held a three-hour Medical Civil Action Program in the Tharwa district of southern Sadr City, treating 318 men, women and children who came in off the street for the clinic, which was announced by loudspeakers just an hour before it began.
U.S. troops provided security for the event, standing watch, patrolling nearby streets and security screening patients for weapons or bombs as they entered an abandoned school building where the clinic was held.
At nearby Joint Security Station Sadr City, U.S. engineers are continuing work on a new civil military operations center, where district residents can meet with Iraqi officials over issues such as sanitation, reconstruction and electrical power.
Meanwhile, throughout the district U.S. and Iraq troops are visiting homes and surveying residents while also sussing out Mehdi Army gunmen and their weapons caches.
"I think the people here are scared of JAM (Jaish al-Mehdi, the Arabic-language name for the Mehdi Army) and the special groups and have had enough of this fighting," said Capt. Ryan Williams, of Comanche Troop, 1st Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, attached to the 3rd Brigade. "Since it started we've gotten a steady stream of tips on weapons caches and the hideouts -- and they've proved accurate."
Sadr City, with a population of about 2.5 million, is located in the northeast corner of Baghdad and is the stronghold of anti-American cleric Moqtada Sadr and his militia.
A cease-fire between the Mehdi Army and U.S. and Iraqi forces last August helped bring the downturn in violence in Iraq's capital. That cease-fire ended when Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki -- a political rival of Sadr -- sent troops into the southern city of Basra last month to stamp out violence by various Shiite militias, including rogue Mehdi Army cells, and subsequently called for the dismantling of the militia.
On March 25, 107mm and 120mm rockets rained down for days on Baghdad's International Zone, where government offices are located, from southern Sadr City. Militia gunmen also attacked and in many cases overran IA posts in the district as Iraqis police, and in some cases soldiers, bolted their posts. U.S. officials said in many cases, the militia had threatened the families of the police and troops who come from the Baghdad area.
"It was kinda fun spotting them (snipers) and shooting at them the other night until I realized we were practically surrounded," a soldier with Comanche Company said from the roof of a house taken over near Tharwa and made into an operations post. "Then it got heavy."
Comanche was one of a number of units "thunder rushed" into the district to re-establish abandoned IA checkpoints and also stop the rocketing. They were later joined by new IA units -- not from the Baghdad area -- who joined in the fight.
The outpost still receives occasional sniper fire, but the intensity of late last month and earlier this month has waned. Earlier this week an Iraqi soldier firing a machine gun took out two snipers up the road who were targeting them and U.S. forces. But one other still remains, making patrols a hazardous venture.
"I feel safer now with the army back," Hassan Abed al-Karim told soldiers who stopped by his home in the Tharwa district. "My children go to school to the south so they are safe, but I don't allow them to play on the street when home."
The Iraqi lives close to the main road separating northern from southern Sadr City. He said militia would come into his neighborhood and fire rockets from open fields in the area.
Col. John Hort, commander of the 3rd Brigade Combat Team responsible for the area, attributes much of the earlier violence to criminal elements and Iranian-influenced special groups within the Mehdi Army.
"I think it's mainly the special groups with the Iranian influence that are promoting the current state of violence," he said. "I can't speak for what he (Sadr) does, but I will say the mainstream JAM is fighting us in this fight right now.
"We are not just dealing with rogue elements, we are dealing with mainstream JAM in this current fight we are in. And what we've seen is that these JAM members are influenced by these special groups and become sympathetic to the cause -- fight the coalition forces to the last man or kick the ISF (Iraqi Security Forces) out of Sadr City."
Hort said that in the latest round of fighting, the gunmen used battle tactics "you don't just pick up on the Internet."
"This was an organized effort. This wasn't just a bunch of guys who one day decided to take pot shoots at the Iraqi Army," he said.
It's estimated U.S. troops in southern Sadr City "engaged, killed or wounded probably over 400" gunmen, Hort said.
With security increasing daily in southern Sadr City, gunmen have mainly crossed back into northern Sadr City across a main road known as Route Gold (al-Quds Street) where U.S. forces are erecting a 10-foot concrete barrier to control access into and out of southern neighborhoods.
The barrier, which when finished will stretch 3 miles, has come under fire from the Maliki government as well as from Sadr, but U.S. military officials say the controlled access it will afford is essential to security.
"Getting this wall in is our biggest effort right now," Hort said. "We're putting in a wall that will degrade the enemy's ability to conduct operations south of Route Gold. That allows us to conduct significant reconstruction in Jamilla (neighborhood) and Tharwa down into Old Adamiya.
"It is a fight to put that wall in every night. It's a minefield down that road. There have been 115 IEDs along it in the last three weeks."
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