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| Iraq |
| Dupe entry: Shiites say U.S. arrested leader's son |
| 2007-02-23 |
| U.S. troops arrested the son of Iraq's top Shiite politician Friday as he returned to the country from Iran, Shiite officials said. Amar al-Hakim, son of political leader Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, was taken into custody at a crossing point and was transferred to a U.S. facility in Kut, according to the elder al-Hakim's secretary, Jamal al-Sagheer. Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim is leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the country's largest Shiite party with longtime ties to Iran. He met with President Bush at the White House in December, and his party is part of the Shiite alliance that includes Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. U.S. authorities have complained about Iranian weapons sales and financial aid to major Shiite parties in Iraq, especially the Mahdi Army of radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Security guards accompanying the younger al-Hakim were also detained at the Zirbatyah crossing point , al-Sagheer said. U.S. spokesman Lt. Col. Christopher Garver said he was looking into the report. |
| Posted by:Frank G |
| #1 from Yahoo: "I am sorry about the arrest," Khalilzad said. "We don't know the circumstances of the arrest and we are investigating and we don't mean any disrespect to Al-Sayed Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim or his family." A U.S. Embassy spokesman in Baghdad, Lou Fintor, said al-Hakim "was not singled out" and "soldiers were following standard procedure" since the border crossing was closed at the time. But he did not offer details on how al-Hakim's entourage entered Iraqi territory if the crossing point was sealed. The younger al-Hakim, 35, was taken into custody at the Zirbatyah crossing point southeast of Baghdad along with his security guards, said his father's secretary, Jamal al-Sagheer. Al-Hakim was freed about 12 hours later, but his bodyguards remained in custody, al-Sagheer said. The New York Times quoted advisers to al-Hakim as saying American forces had beaten several of the guards after stopping the convoy. The Times also quoted an unidentified U.S. military official as saying al-Hakim was detained because he had an expired passport and was traveling with people who had a large number of guns. But in an interview after his release at the provincial governor's office in Kut, al-Hakim displayed a passport with an expiration date of Sept. 17, 2007, the Times reported on its Web site Friday. "They arrested me and my guards in an unsuitable way, and they bound my hands and blindfolded me," the Times quoted Amar al-Hakim as saying. "They took our phones, bags, money, documents and the guards weapons, and sent us to an American base." "They claim the reason for the arrest was because my passport had expired," he said, "but as you can see my passport expires on the 17th of September." Although the reason for the detention was not immediately clear, suspicion fell on Washington's accusations about suspected Iranian weapons or money pipelines to major Shiite groups, including SCIRI and sometimes-rival the Mahdi Army militia of radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Both Washington and Iraqi leaders have vowed that no one would be exempt as the major security operation is under way in Baghdad. "Washington doesn't want to start a war with Iran, but instead is trying to set some boundaries," said Andrew Exum, a regional affairs analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "This (al-Hakim) situation may not be true saber rattling, but a kind of saber rattling to try to contain Iranian influence." A Shiite lawmaker, Hameed Moalah, said he wasn't sure what message Washington was trying to send. "But it is certainly a negative one," he added. |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-02-23 20:28 |