Spanish and Iraqi soldiers fought gunmen who opened fire on their garrison during a protest yesterday by supporters of a staunchly anti-American Shiite Muslim cleric in the holy city of Najaf. At least 14 Iraqis, including two soldiers, died and 130 people were injured, hospitals said.
Yesterday afternoon, gunfire was heard in central Baghdad during a protest by supporters of the cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr. It was not immediately known whether there were injuries.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Two US Marines died in violence in Anbar province, an enormous stretch of land reaching to the Jordanian and Syrian borders west of Baghdad that includes Fallujah, a city where four American civilians were slain on Wednesday. North of the capital, a bomb killed three members of the Iraqi security forces.
In Najaf, shooting broke out after thousands of supporters of an anti-American Muslim cleric gathered outside the garrison of the Spanish troops.
An official at Najaf General Hospital, Alaa Murtada, said seven bodies were brought to the hospital. He said the hospital treated at least 90 people.
Witnesses saw four bodies at al-Zahraa Hospital and a nurse there, Saad Abdel-Hussein, said at least 30 people were injured, some seriously.
Three bodies and 10 injured people were brought to Sadr Educational Hospital in Najaf, said doctor Ra'ad al-Hadrawi.
The slain Iraqi soldiers were inside the Spanish base, according to witnesses.
A spokesman for the Spanish headquarters in nearby Diwaniyah, Commander Carlos Herradon, said attackers opened fire at around noon on the Spanish base in Najaf, and Spanish soldiers fired back. Assailants later regrouped in three clusters outside the base, and gunfire continued into the afternoon, he said.
Herradon said that he had no figures on the number of dead and injured.
The crowd was protesting the reported detention of an aide to al-Sadr, a Shiite Muslim cleric who opposes the US-led occupation of Iraq.
Some 5,000 people marched to the garrison of the Spanish military contingent in Najaf after hearing that Mustafa al-Yacoubi, a senior al-Sadr aide, had been detained.
Spanish troops in the area have said they had no information on al-Yacoubi's reported detention, and said they did not take part in any such operation.
In central Baghdad's Firdaus Square, hundreds of al-Sadr supporters rallied to protest against al-Yaqoubi's reported arrest.
Al-Sadr's office in Baghdad issued a statement later yesterday, calling off street protests and saying the cleric would stage a sit-in at a mosque in the city of Kufa, which is near Najaf, where he has for months been delivering weekly sermons.
About 5,000 members of al-Sadr's self-styled militia, the al-Mahdi Army, paraded in Sadr City, a mainly Shiite district in eastern Baghdad, on Saturday.
Al-Sadr's weekly newspaper was shut by US officials on March 28, prompting an angry response from his supporters.
Two US Marines, both assigned to the 1st Marine Division, were killed as a result of separate "enemy action" in Anbar province on Saturday, the military said in a statement. One died the same day; the other died yesterday. The statement provided no other details.
A bomb exploded yesterday near a checkpoint in Samarra, about 100km north of Baghdad, that was manned by Iraqi Civil Defense Corps personnel, killing three and wounding one, workers at Samarra General Hospital said.
In the city of Baqouba, 50km northeast of Baghdad, a bomb exploded yesterday in the al-Rasool al-Adham Shiite mosque, damaging part of the building, but causing no casualties, said the mosque's caretaker Haider Yassin.
CSBC Corp, Taiwan (台灣國際造船) yesterday released the first video documenting the submerged sea trials of Taiwan’s indigenous defense submarine prototype, the Hai Kun (海鯤), or Narwhal, showing underwater navigation and the launch of countermeasures. The footage shows the vessel’s first dive, steering and control system tests, and the raising and lowering of the periscope and antenna masts. It offered a rare look at the progress in the submarine’s sea acceptance tests. The Hai Kun carried out its first shallow-water diving trial late last month and has since completed four submerged tests, CSBC said. The newly released video compiles images recorded from Jan. 29 to
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) plans to make advanced 3-nanometer chips in Japan, stepping up its semiconductor manufacturing roadmap in the country in a triumph for Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s technology ambitions. TSMC is to adopt cutting-edge technology for its second wafer fab in Kumamoto, company chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) said yesterday. That is an upgrade from an original blueprint to produce 7-nanometer chips by late next year, people familiar with the matter said. TSMC began mass production at its first plant in Japan’s Kumamoto in late 2024. Its second fab, which is still under construction, was originally focused on
DETERRENCE EFFORTS: Washington and partners hope demonstrations of force would convince Beijing that military action against Taiwan would carry high costs The US is considering using HMAS Stirling in Western Australia as a forward base to strengthen its naval posture in a potential conflict with China, particularly over Taiwan, the Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. As part of its Indo-Pacific strategy, Washington plans to deploy up to four nuclear-powered submarines at Stirling starting in 2027, providing a base near potential hot spots such as Taiwan and the South China Sea. The move also aims to enhance military integration with Pacific allies under the Australia-UK-US trilateral security partnership, the report said. Currently, US submarines operate from Guam, but the island could
EMERGING FIELDS: The Chinese president said that the two countries would explore cooperation in green technology, the digital economy and artificial intelligence Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday called for an “equal and orderly multipolar world” in the face of “unilateral bullying,” in an apparent jab at the US. Xi was speaking during talks in Beijing with Uruguayan President Yamandu Orsi, the first South American leader to visit China since US special forces captured then-Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro last month — an operation that Beijing condemned as a violation of sovereignty. Orsi follows a slew of leaders to have visited China seeking to boost ties with the world’s second-largest economy to hedge against US President Donald Trump’s increasingly unpredictable administration. “The international situation is fraught
RSS