Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's militia began slowly turning in weapons yesterday under a deal with the Iraqi government aimed at bringing a halt to months of deadly fighting in a Baghdad slum.
But anti-US attacks continued, with two US soldiers killed in a rocket attack in Baghdad and two Iraqis killed in a car bomb attack on a US military convoy in the northern city of Mosul.
Armed men claiming to belong to the militant group of Iraq's most wanted man Abu Musab al-Zarqawi appeared in a video threatening to behead a Turkish hostage.
In the teeming Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad, machine guns, mortar launchers and ammunition were trickling in to police stations under the five-day test agreement that could clear the road for a lasting truce in one of the major flashpoints of the Iraq insurgency.
A deal would shore up one flank for the US and Iraqi forces in the run-up to national polls planned for January, allowing them to concentrate on Fallujah, the epicenter of the Sunni Muslim insurgency, and other trouble spots around central Iraq.
In Sadr City, police, many of them Sadr supporters, told reporters they thought the militiamen mistrusted the Iraqi government and the US military and feared the other side might take advantage of the truce to crush their movement.
Under the terms of the deal, described as a loose verbal pact, there is a five-day test period for the weapons surrender after which the Iraqi army will move in and patrol Sadr City, where the Shiite militia has ruled by the gun for months, while the government has offered to free some detained Sadr supporters.
Intermediaries handed in weapons at one of three police stations serving as drop-off centers which had been cordoned off by police and Iraqi national guard. US army troops were also present at the sites.
At one station in the heart of the teeming district, about a dozen machine guns, 12 mortar rounds, 38 mortar launchers and a sniper rifle were handed in.
Sadr City, home to 2.5 million people, has been devastated by six months of fighting between the US army and Sadr's militia. Intense air strikes and street skirmishes are believed to have sharply reduced the militia's ranks from more than 10,000 followers to less than 2,000 since April, the US military says.
The US battalion commander for Sadr City, Lieutenant-Colonel Gary Volesky, warned that his men reserved the right to carry out raids and arrests despite the five-day test period for Sadr's men to relinquish heavy and medium weapons.
"There has been no ceasefire agreement. The freedom of our movement has not been limited in any way. If we get the intel [intelligence] to support doing a search or raid on a target we have that flexibility to do it," he said.
Iraqi national security advisor Kassem Daoud hailed the agreement Sunday and said the government had more than US$500 million to rebuild Sadr City, with US$150 million coming from the US.
MAKING WAVES: China’s maritime militia could become a nontraditional threat in war, clogging up shipping lanes to prevent US or Japanese intervention, a report said About 1,900 Chinese ships flying flags of convenience and fishing vessels that participated in China’s military exercises around Taiwan last month and in January have been listed for monitoring, Coast Guard Administration (CGA) Deputy Director-General Hsieh Ching-chin (謝慶欽) said yesterday. Following amendments to the Commercial Port Act (商港法) and the Law of Ships (船舶法) last month, the CGA can designate possible berthing areas or deny ports of call for vessels suspected of loitering around areas where undersea cables can be accessed, Oceans Affairs Council Minister Kuan Bi-ling (管碧玲) said. The list of suspected ships, originally 300, had risen to about 1,900 as
Right-wing political scientist Laura Fernandez on Sunday won Costa Rica’s presidential election by a landslide, after promising to crack down on rising violence linked to the cocaine trade. Fernandez’s nearest rival, economist Alvaro Ramos, conceded defeat as results showed the ruling party far exceeding the threshold of 40 percent needed to avoid a runoff. With 94 percent of polling stations counted, the political heir of outgoing Costa Rican President Rodrigo Chaves had captured 48.3 percent of the vote compared with Ramos’ 33.4 percent, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal said. As soon as the first results were announced, members of Fernandez’s Sovereign People’s Party
MORE RESPONSIBILITY: Draftees would be expected to fight alongside professional soldiers, likely requiring the transformation of some training brigades into combat units The armed forces are to start incorporating new conscripts into combined arms brigades this year to enhance combat readiness, the Executive Yuan’s latest policy report said. The new policy would affect Taiwanese men entering the military for their compulsory service, which was extended to one year under reforms by then-president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in 2022. The conscripts would be trained to operate machine guns, uncrewed aerial vehicles, anti-tank guided missile launchers and Stinger air defense systems, the report said, adding that the basic training would be lengthened to eight weeks. After basic training, conscripts would be sorted into infantry battalions that would take
GROWING AMBITIONS: The scale and tempo of the operations show that the Strait has become the core theater for China to expand its security interests, the report said Chinese military aircraft incursions around Taiwan have surged nearly 15-fold over the past five years, according to a report released yesterday by the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) Department of China Affairs. Sorties in the Taiwan Strait were previously irregular, totaling 380 in 2020, but have since evolved into routine operations, the report showed. “This demonstrates that the Taiwan Strait has become both the starting point and testing ground for Beijing’s expansionist ambitions,” it said. Driven by military expansionism, China is systematically pursuing actions aimed at altering the regional “status quo,” the department said, adding that Taiwan represents the most critical link in China’s
RSS