|
Mortar Attack Hits al-Sadr Compound
Two 82mm mortar rounds hit the Shiite cleric's compound, which is in a neighborhood controlled by Sadr's forces in the northeast of the Shiite holy city of Najaf. One round struck by the front gate, injuring the guard and a neighborhood child, Yacoubi said. Yacoubi gave no details of any casualties inside Sadr's house, except to say Sadr was not wounded. Yacoubi said the strike appeared to have been fired at close-range from another house in the neighborhood. Angry followers of the young Shiite cleric surrounded Sadr's compound after the barrage. Shortly after the attack, the cleric issued a statement calling for calm among his followers. "I call upon all brothers to stay calm and I call upon the Iraqi army to protect the pilgrims as the Nawasib (militants) are aiming to attack Shiites everyday," the statement said, according to the Associated Press. In other violence, a 13-year-old boy was killed by a roadside bomb as he arrived at school in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, news agencies reported. The bomb outside the school went off at 7:30 a.m., just as children were arriving for classes in Basra's city center, police Capt. Mushtaq Kadim said, according to the Associated Press. In Iraq, the school week runs Sunday to Thursday, with Friday a rest day for the Muslim day of prayers. Yacoubi, al-Sadr's aide, refused to call the mortar attack on al-Sadr's compound an assassination attempt, but rather called it a threat to al-Sadr's life. Al-Sadr, Yacoubi said, "is calling on his followers and the Iraqi people to remain calm, and not to be dragged into sectarian strife." In the past two months, attacks on two Shiite targets -- a Shiite shrine in the city of Samarra, and Baghdad's Sadr City neighborhood, a stronghold of Sadr support -- have unleashed the greatest sectarian bloodletting since U.S. forces overthrew Saddam Hussein in 2003. Sadr issued similar appeals for calm after both attacks. However, Sadr's thousands-strong Mahdi Army militia is accused by many U.S. officials and others in the violent retaliation to the mosque bombing and Sadr City attack. Sadr inherited the house from his father, and uses it as his house and as his main office, where he meets with dignitaries and others. Posted by: lotp 2006-03-26 |
|
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=146645 |