Posted on 03/28/2008 6:20:24 AM PDT by jhpigott
Baghdad, 28 March (AKI) - Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki has reportedly extended the 72-hour deadline for Shia militiamen fighting security forces in the southern city of Basra, to hand over their weapons.
The Iraqi prime minister had originally set a deadline of 29 March for the militias to give up their arms but on Friday he extended it until 8 April.
Fighting is continuing between Shia militias and Iraqi security forces and reports say that more than 130 people have been killed and 350 injured since a clampdown on the militias began in the oil-rich city on Tuesday.
Some 30,000 Iraqi troops and police have been involved in the operation against the Shia Mahdi Army, led by radical Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
Al-Maliki, who has personally overseen the operation, said that he will continue fighting the militias for as long as necessary.
"We have made up our minds to enter this battle and we will continue until the end. No retreat," al-Maliki said in a speech broadcast on Iraqi state television on Thursday.
American president George W. Bush praised al-Maliki's decision to order the crackdown, saying "normalcy was returning to Iraq".
According to a report on the Voices of Iraq news agency, fierce clashes erupted in the southern city of Nassiriya on Friday and at least four policemen were killed in the fighting.
Iraqi security forces have reportedly asked for American soldiers and military helicopters to aid them in the operations.
A three-day curfew was also imposed on the Iraqi capital Baghdad on Thursday. Before the curfew, thousands of al-Sadr supporters protested against the current operation and called on al-Maliki to step down.
Get the Mook Mook.
ping
i’ve seen speculated elsewhere on this board that Maliki is the one who is really in bed with the Iranians more so the Sadr. And that one of the Iraqi Army’s brigades (Badr brigade) is largely influenced by the Iranian regime and that this whole flare-up is just tribal infighting amongst the Shia.
“extends deadline”
That sums it up right there.
Once more Maliki shows he’s not ready for prime time.
Mookie will be there even after McCain’s 100 years expire.
i think Sadr is dead and has been for a while. He was reported to be in a bad coma a few months ago and i have not seen a live shot of him since.
If he is still alive, i’d lay low if i was him until Bush’s term ends otherwise i’d bet Bush green lights him getting whacked before he leaves office
I would argue that you don’t understand Arabs. They don’t do well with timelines or deadlines. They don’t have a time constrained mentality.
It is almost foolish to expect the various Arab parties involved to respond on time. They deliberate endlessly and it sometimes seems they enjoy the deliberation more than they value a solution that will eventually happen.
The trading cannot be rushed
Okay, I said TURN IN THOSE WEAPONS, I’m really, really series, I really am!
Bert, I am old enough to remember the same logic being applied to the Japanese, and how we needed to understand the oriental mind.
Two demonstrations of what it was like to be 3000 degrees in the shade in August 1945 quickly instilled in them “a time constrained mentality”.
Did Maliki just blink? Might be a bad sign. These creeps seem to understand only brute force. Things like this, setting back the deadline, can appear to be a sign of weakness to the islamofascists and insurgents.
Hope he knows what he’s doing...
wouldn’t hold my breath on Maliki, he’s in bed with Iran as well
“I am old enough to remember the same logic being applied to the Japanese, and how we needed to understand the oriental mind.”
?????????????????
“he’s in bed with Iran as well”
The fact that his forces are waging war on Iranian backed militias sheds serious doubt on this long held theory of the defeatist crowd.
hardly a defeatist here
just calling a spade a spade. GWB, himself, has publically come out and smacked Maliki on the hand for his relations with Iran
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