[TexKat]

BAGHDAD Iraqi government forces have been forced to strike a truce with Shiite militia fighters after at least 28 people, many of them soldiers, were killed in fierce fighting in the southern city of Diwaniya.

On Tuesday, hours after the deal was reached, at least 27 people were killed when a leaking pipeline from which they were siphoning fuel exploded near Diwaniya, Iraqi officials said.

One official said that the fuel scavengers were taking advantage of turmoil in the city Monday that resulted when Iraqi Army soldiers clashed with members of a militia loyal to Moktada al-Sadr, a radical Shiite cleric.

In Diwaniya on Tuesday, news agencies reported that militia members had begun withdrawing from the contested areas of the city, in accord with the truce reached with the Iraqi security forces late Monday.

The fighting on Monday, in which militiamen executed disarmed Iraqi soldiers in a public square, according to an Iraqi general, amounted to the most brazen clashes in recent memory between Iraqi government forces and Sadr's militia

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/08/29/news/iraq.php

[bnelson44]

IHT==NYT

[bnelson44]

On Tuesday, hours after the deal was reached, at least 27 people were killed when a leaking pipeline from which they were siphoning fuel exploded near Diwaniya, Iraqi officials said.

Which, they neglected to mention, had absolutly nothing to do with the truce in Baghdad.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

See post #32....some media is lying as usual!