Moqtada al-Sadr orders Iraq PM out of Basra

Telegraph UK ^ | 2:53am GMT 27/03/2008 | Damien McElroy, Foreign Affairs Correspondent

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

The Iraqi cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has demanded that the country's prime minister leave Basra where he is overseeing a military operation to purge the southern city of its radical Shi'ite militiamen.

• SAS trooper shot dead in al-Qa'eda raid
• Q&A: Who is Moqtada al-Sadr?

  Relations between Sadr and Nouri al-Maliki have deteriorated sharply as the two men clashed over fighting between Iraqi forces and gunmen in Sadrist communities in Iraq.

  
  An Iraqi man carries the body of his son, who was killed during clashes in Basra, during a funeral, while militia loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr guards a street in the city
  
  

  Mr Maliki gave followers of Sadr and other Shi'ite gunmen 72 hours to surrender their weapons and renounce violence or bear the brunt of a military crackdown.

  "We are not going to chase those who hand over their weapons within 72 hours," said Mr Maliki. "If they do not surrender their arms, the law will follow its course."

  A spokesman for Sadr said his movement had appealed to Mr Maliki to reduce tensions in the city by returning to Baghdad and sending a parliamentary delegation to seek an end to fighting.

  Liwa Sumaysim, a spokesman for Sadr said: "Sadr has asked prime minister Maliki to leave Basra and to send a parliamentary delegation to resolve the crisis in the city."

[PsyOp]

Time to put a price on dough-boy’s head.

[VRWCmember]

I say we take off and nuke the whole station from orbit; it’s the only way to be sure.

[ichabod1]

Anschluss.

[mowowie]

lol

[nicko]

yep...remember it well... SGT Johnson tellin’ me...”first we’re gonna practice dry firing with a dime on the barrel...when the dime doesn’t fall off about 100 times in a row, we’ll move on- now breath in, half out...squeeze, don’t pull...opps,looks like you’ll have to start counting all over again...”

[untrained skeptic]

Sounds like Sadr is losing badly and wants to use the Palestinian ploy of negotiating a deal to stop the fighting so they can rearm and reorganize themselves.

Hopefully Maliki is smart enough to keep the pressure on until the militia surrenders.

[NormsRevenge]

I need to review some of my wild west movies,....I have fond memories of Cowboys and Indians.....watched with popcorn...

--

don't forget when mices ruled the silver screen. :-)

The Disney movies are pretty good too.. ;-)

Diyala patrol : A US soldier from Ghostrider Company 3rd Squadron 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, steps out of a bathroom newly renovated by coalition forces and painted with cartoons of Mickey Mouse in the restive Diyala province, located northeast of Baghdad. (AFP/David Furst)

[NormsRevenge]

meanwhile elsewhere in Diyala.. 37 bodies found in a mass grave..

A human skull is pictured at a mass grave in southern Iraq in
2007. According to a US military statement, Iraqi and US forces
have found 37 bodies in a mass grave uncovered in the
restive province of Diyala, northeast of Baghdad.
(AFP/File/Ahmad Abdel Razzak)

[not2worry]

Sadr should have been taken out when the war started, IMHO.

[TXnMA]

Yep. And I'd like to have a Raufoss Mk211 .50 BMG round in the chamber of the Barrett when I do so.

(FYI, back in the '60s, when the USAF announced the availability of the USAF Small Arms Markmanship Ribbon, there were three names on the very first orders cut awarding it on Yokota AFB, Japan. My name was one of those three -- and I did it with a M2 .30 carbine...)

[Popman]

Good. The final battle is beginning.

I'm surprised it took 43 posts for someone to say that

This is the beginning of the end. Iran is playing their final hand.

I just hope Nouri al-Maliki has the fortitude to finish the hand, by cutting off he head of Iran's snake in his mist

[RightWhale]

This is partly Jane’s analysis and is very high in reality content:
spacewar.com
by Ben Lando
Washington (UPI) Mar 26, 2008
Fighting in Iraq’s oil capital Basra isn’t the first bloodshed between varying political and armed groups but may be the decisive battle for control over the oil sector, local government and the fate of the province.
This week Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki launched an Iraqi Security Forces offensive into Basra.

The violence that has killed dozens and injured hundreds since Tuesday is billed as Iraq’s military against “criminals, terrorist forces and outlaws,” in the words of Maliki. But political parties and their militias have gained a stronghold in Baghdad and Basra, from elected office to the security forces, police and those protecting the oil infrastructure. And the battle is looking more like two leading political parties against two disenfranchised parties, all Shiite Arab.

“It’s an internal Shiite war for who is going to represent the Shiite community in Iraq,” said Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East expert at the Congressional Research Service. The operation was planned a month ago, he said, and the target was the illegal activity like oil smuggling taking place under the control of the Fadhila Party and other armed groups.

The Mahdi Army of cleric Moqtada Sadr says it’s the target of the Iraq Security Forces that have been infiltrated by the Badr Corps of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. ISCI is a large and crucial member of the coalition government, along with Maliki’s Dawa Party.

ISCI and Dawa have the overarching support of Washington, while Sadr has been alternately targeted and left alone and Fadhila ignored, like the rest of the south, until now.

Painting the Mahdi Army as the “bad guys ¿¿ can be a dangerous oversimplification,” Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic & International Studies wrote Wednesday following a recent visit in Iraq. “No one should romanticize Maliki, Al Dawa, or the Hakim faction/ISCI. The current fighting is as much a power struggle for control of the south, and the Shiite parts of Baghdad and the rest of the country, as an effort to establish central government authority and legitimate rule.”

Maliki and other top government officials are in Basra as the Iraqi Security Forces begin their offensive, though past army attempts to tamp violence there have failed. Armed forces without government authority have until Friday to turn in weapons. U.S. and British air support is reportedly assisting the ISF.

British forces, which ran Basra until December, have reduced their numbers and largely stay in the city airport. Their laissez-faire occupation strategy allowed the province to flourish in illegal smuggling of products, from autos to fuel. Religious fundamentalism grew to a point where women are openly targeted and killed for their choice of clothes. Political parties, gangs and militias intermixed, both in economics and bullets.

Basra province contains most of Iraq’s oil reserves, 80 percent of oil production and the Persian Gulf port where 90 percent of exports head to market.

“In the short term, the current situation in Basra is not expected to affect oil output and exports,” said Rochdi Younsi of the business risk firm Eurasia Group. “If violence persists, the situation has the potential of deteriorating rapidly into an intra-Shia conflict, which would have considerable consequence on stability in the oil-rich region of southern Iraq.”

Control of the oil — and the billions in monthly legal oil and fuel and crude black market sales — is a fight years in the making. The three main political parties — and their militias — have battled for control since 2003, in between varied power- and illegal-revenue-sharing agreements, and failed efforts by the Iraqi army and government to stop graft and violence.

Ahead of the British handover, dozens of religious and political factions, including the big three, signed a peace accord.

The Fadhila Party won 2005 provincial elections, holds the governor’s seat and controls the guards at Iraq’s southernmost oil installations. The Sadr Movement has no major elected positions in Basra but has public support. The two represent Iraq’s working class and poor, oppressed since before Saddam Hussein. At times they’ve formed alliances or held shootouts in the street. Both are targeted by Iraq’s more dominant parties — Dawa and especially ISCI, representing the well-off, elite Iraqis.

“I see it as a real class struggle in many ways,” said the CRS’ Katzman.

Fadhila and Sadr both won seats in the 2005 parliamentary elections and were part of the Dawa/ISCI-led governing coalition. But both have since quit the coalition and council of ministers: Fadhila after the oil minister loosely linked to the party was replaced by one loosely linked to ISCI; Sadr after dissatisfaction including lax rebuilding of a key Shiite mosque.

The ISCI orchestrated a vote of no confidence in Basra’s provincial council, though the Fadhila governor remains in power.

Sadr has formally paused his militia, the Mahdi Army’s activities, and a seven-month cease-fire — credited by Washington for part of the recent reduction in violence in Iraq — is now on the brink of total reversal. He has said his members can defend themselves but not take the offensive.

Sadr has accused ISCI of infiltrating the security forces with its Badr Corps militia and taking advantage of the cease-fire by targeting the Mahdi Army and Sadr supporters around the Shiite-controlled south. The same security forces are now part of the Basra offensive, raising questions as to its true aim, both for Sadr and Fadhila.

Provincial elections are to be held in October, and next month provinces can form their own region — like the semiautonomous Kurds in the north, ISCI wants a super-Shiite region of nine southern provinces while Fadhila is pushing for Basra to become a region itself — two reasons to consolidate local power.

The future of Basra is as easy to predict as motives of varying parties, all with survival and power as key end goals.

“Violence is probably going to deteriorate before it gets better,” said David Hartwell, Middle East and North Africa editor for Jane’s Country Risk, adding it depends how much support factions, especially Sadr, garner in the fight. “My guess is that it will burn bright but not particularly long.”

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Now that’s cool!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thanks for that information.....

So it's sectarian war among the Shia's......

Listening to Foxnews....Baghdad under lockdown and Legislature has an emergency session planned tomorrow.

[Marine_Uncle]

As I read Bill Roggio's column at the Long War Journal HERE it becomes more clear that the fat one is no longer calling the shots within Sadr's Mahdi Army.
The Qods forces are running the show most likely and Sadr is becoming more of a sideliner.
But surely it would not hurt for him to be taken out wherever he is residing.
I hope Maliki has reached the point where Sadr City will be fully cordoned off, no one enters, no one leaves, other then Iraqi and US Special Forces supported by regulars, to do street by street close downs and total searches for any form of weapontry.
These people must be shown that the forces are willing and available to shut them totally down. Maliki must start getting more involved in national address. It is high time someone tells the Iraqi in whole that they are their worst enemies, and if they want things to get better, then, then they had better go along with the program.
Everyone keeps talking about these peoples respecting the use of force. Well. High time Sadr City starts to feel some real pain, like Fallujah and ar Ramadi did.
Of course the totality of what can be done in the souther provinces with Basra high lighted is a bit more complex. But equally important. This crap about huge amounts of oil, benzene, gas, etc., being siphoned off the top for black market use has to stop along with the equal lawless behavior among these people.
Perhaps I write to much. Simply put. Maliki must show all he can be brutal as the goon squads that kill the innocent, within the laws of their land. I see three final battles. One in Basra, Mosul, and Sadr City Baghdad.
We are unfortunately seeing a major swing from al Qaeda being the principle enemy of Iraq to one where the Shia Militias are dominating the scene of violence.
GWB is only around till the end of the January 2009.
Notice how quiet Hakim and his Badr Brigade appear to be right now. Wonder if they will enter into the fray and even make things worse in the south.

[NRA2BFree]

Bush should have let the troops take Moqtada al-Sadr out and destroy that hell hole when he first started all the trouble. Now, he’s been to Iran for a while and is back to make trouble again. I sincerely hope that Bush stays out of it this time and lets our guys go in there and kill him and destroy his militia! Too many of our troops have died because of that terrorist pos, and now, more will probably die. It’s past time for Moqtada al-Sadr to die!

[bill1952]

Real power is displayed by going in and kicking ass.

Not by giving Sadr 72 hours or 72 seconds.
The fact that he has done so is proof that the minister either is circumscribed in his powers to remove Sadr, or unsure that he has that ability at all.

Sadr can see this pretty clearly.

[FreeReign]

“It’s an internal Shiite war for who is going to represent the Shiite community in Iraq,” said Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East expert at the Congressional.

No.

This is a fight between the Iraqi army and illegal militias.

Don't tell me you actually fall for Ben Lando's pathetic characterization.

Ya know, when a Shiite majority government doesn't go after the illegal Shiite militias they are criticized (and deservedly so). So now, the Shiite majority government goes after illegal Shiite militias, and this clown with his pathetic Drive-By spin says that it's an "internal Shiite war".

And people on this thread nod their heads and say yeah.

LOLOLOL!

[FreeReign]

We are unfortunately seeing a major swing from al Qaeda being the principle enemy of Iraq to one where the Shia Militias are dominating the scene of violence.

No. We are fortunately seeing Al Qaeda defeated and we are fortunately now finally seeing the Shiite Militias dealt with.

[FreeReign]

Real power is displayed by going in and kicking ass. Not by giving Sadr 72 hours or 72 seconds. The fact that he has done so is proof that the minister either is circumscribed in his powers to remove Sadr, or unsure that he has that ability at all. Sadr can see this pretty clearly.

The Iraqi federal government has sent 15,000 security forces and they are "conducting aggressive military operations … trying to rid the city of militias, thugs, smugglers that have been plaguing it for months".

Link

I'm guessing fat-boy sees it more clearly...than you do.