Up to nine coalition soldiers and 24 Iraqis were killed and more than 200 people wounded, after a radical Shiite leader urged his supporters to "terrorize" the enemy, while top US lawmakers called for more US troops in Iraq.
It was the worst fighting between US forces and the country's Shiite majority since the US-led invasion of Iraq one year ago when US troops were welcomed as liberators by the community.
PHOTO: AFP
Late Sunday, a pitched battle with the militia of young Shiite firebrand Moqtada Sadr claimed the lives of seven US soldiers in the poverty-stricken Baghdad suburb of Sadr City.
Top US lawmakers, questioning whether the June 30 deadline for handover to Iraqi sovereignty was realistic in light of the upsurge in violence, called for more US troops in Iraq.
"I think it's probably time to have that debate," Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana, Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told ABC. He called the employment of 3,000 people in a future US embassy there, amid no current nomination for an ambassador "a huge new exposure of Americans."
The US-led coalition occupying Iraq, under pressure from its allies and factions inside Iraq, agreed last year to hand over sovereignty to an interim government by July 1.
Lugar and the committee's leading Democrat, Senator Joseph Biden of Delaware, said the latest violence showed Iraqi security forces unprepared for the handover date.
They said more US troops would be needed to disarm militias threatening stability of a new Iraqi government.
In an ominous development that threatens to widen the rift between Iraq's Shiite majority and the occupation forces, Sadr told supporters to "terrorize" the enemy, saying demonstrations were now pointless.
"Terrorise your enemy, as we cannot remain silent over its violations," Sadr said in a statement distributed Sunday by his office in Kufa, south of Baghdad. It was not clear if Sadr was literally calling on his followers to resort to violence.
In the fighting in Baghdad, the US soldiers died trying to prevent members of Sadr's several thousand-strong Mehdi Army, militias made up of mainly unemployed, young Shiites, taking control of police and public buildings.
Ten Iraqis were wounded and a US military humvee vehicle was set ablaze.
AIR DEFENSE: The Norwegian missile system has proved highly effective in Ukraine in its war against Russia, and the US has recommended it for Taiwan, an expert said The Norwegian Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS) Taiwan ordered from the US would be installed in strategically important positions in Taipei and New Taipei City to guard the region, the Ministry of National Defense said in statement yesterday. The air defense system would be deployed in Taipei’s Songshan District (松山) and New Taipei City’s Tamsui District (淡水), the ministry said, adding that the systems could be delivered as soon as the end of this year. The US Defense Security Cooperation Agency has previously said that three NASAMS would be sold to Taiwan. The weapons are part of the 17th US arms sale to
INSURRECTION: The NSB said it found evidence the CCP was seeking snipers in Taiwan to target members of the military and foreign organizations in the event of an invasion The number of Chinese spies prosecuted in Taiwan has grown threefold over a four-year period, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said in a report released yesterday. In 2021 and 2022, 16 and 10 spies were prosecuted respectively, but that number grew to 64 last year, it said, adding that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was working with gangs in Taiwan to develop a network of armed spies. Spies in Taiwan have on behalf of the CCP used a variety of channels and methods to infiltrate all sectors of the country, and recruited Taiwanese to cooperate in developing organizations and obtaining sensitive information
BREAKTHROUGH: The US is making chips on par in yield and quality with Taiwan, despite people saying that it could not happen, the official said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has begun producing advanced 4-nanometer (nm) chips for US customers in Arizona, US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said, a milestone in the semiconductor efforts of the administration of US President Joe Biden. In November last year, the commerce department finalized a US$6.6 billion grant to TSMC’s US unit for semiconductor production in Phoenix, Arizona. “For the first time ever in our country’s history, we are making leading edge 4-nanometer chips on American soil, American workers — on par in yield and quality with Taiwan,” Raimondo said, adding that production had begun in recent
Seven hundred and sixty-four foreigners were arrested last year for acting as money mules for criminals, with many entering Taiwan on a tourist visa for all-expenses-paid trips, the Criminal Investigation Bureau (CIB) said on Saturday. Although from Jan. 1 to Dec. 26 last year, 26,478 people were arrested for working as money mules, the bureau said it was particularly concerned about those entering the country as tourists or migrant workers who help criminals and scammers pick up or transfer illegally obtained money. In a report, officials divided the money mules into two groups, the first of which are foreigners, mainly from Malaysia
RSS