US and Iraqi forces arrested a top aide to radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr yesterday in Baghdad, his office said.
Sheik Abdul-Hadi al-Darraji, al-Sadr's media director in Baghdad, was captured during a 2am raid on a mosque in the eastern neighborhood of Baladiyat, an official in al-Sadr's office said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The US military said special Iraqi army forces operating with coalition advisers captured a high-level, illegal armed group leader in Baladiyat, but it did not identify the detainee. It said two other suspects were detained by Iraqi forces for further questioning.
The raid near Baghdad's Sadr City district came as Defense Secretary Robert Gates flew in to the southern city of Basra to meet the US commander in Iraq, General George Casey.
Dealing with Sadr and his Mehdi Army militia is a burning issue for the US and Shiite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki as they prepare what many see as a last-ditch effort to rein in sectarian violence that is pushing Iraq into civil war.
Sadr, a young populist cleric with a mass following and some backing from Shiite Iran, is a key ally of Maliki, who has been criticized by Washington and leaders of the once-dominant Sunni Arab minority for failing to disarm the Mehdi Army.
Maliki, however, has said this month he will crack down on Shiite militias and said some 400 Mehdi Army members had been arrested in mainly Shiite southern Iraq over recent days.
The US military said in a statement that Iraqi special forces backed by US advisers seized an unnamed man they described as a death squad leader in Baladiyat wanted for kidnap, torture and murder and linked to fugitive Shiite warlord Abu Deraa.
Aides to Sadr said the man held was Abdul-Hadi al-Darraji, a prominent media spokesman for their movement. An official in Sadr's political office branded his detention a deliberate "provocation" but said they would not respond with violence.
"He was arrested at midnight with two cousins," Abdul-Mehdi al-Matiri said, adding that a guard was shot dead during the arrest and that he believed the two others detained had since been released.
The US statement made no mention of any violence and US officials had no immediate comment. Though the statement did not identify Darraji, details of the operation given by the US military coincided with those given by Sadr's office.
`ANGRY'
Matiri said: "We are angry. This is a kind of revenge. Sheikh Darraji deals with the media. He is not a military man."
The US military said: "In an Iraqi-led operation, special Iraqi army forces captured a high-level, illegal armed group leader during operations with Coalition advisers."
It said he was suspected of leading "punishment" activities -- an apparent reference to informal courts meting out rough justice according to strict interpretations of Islamic law. These included "kidnapping, torture and murder."
Maliki has in the past criticized raids on Shiite groups conducted by Iraqi army special forces under the direct command of US officers, saying he has not been adequately consulted.
However, he has announced that the coming crackdown in Baghdad, backed by most of the 21,500 US reinforcements being sent by President George W. Bush, will tackle Shiite militias as well as Sunni insurgents.
In other violence, after a bloody few days of bombings in Baghdad, an official in Sadr's movement said a Shiite mosque in the violent southern district of Dora was badly damaged in an explosion.
In the northern oil capital of Kirkuk, police said gunmen killed the preacher of a major Sunni mosque.
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