Iraq Shiites Urge Cleric to Desist

NY Times

5-5-04

JOHN F. BURNS

"Shiites should give the American forces a green light to go after Mr.
Sadr in the holy cities. "Najaf is not Mecca," he said. "The Americans
don't want to go into the shrines. They want to get rid of criminals
and thieves. So what if they enter the city?" Across the roof, dozens
of men responded approvingly. "Yes, yes!", they said."

BAGHDAD, Iraq, May 4 — Representatives of Iraq's most influential
Shiite leaders met here on Tuesday and demanded that Moktada al-Sadr,
a rebel Shiite cleric, withdraw militia units from the holy cities of
Najaf and Karbala, stop turning the mosques there into weapons
arsenals and return power to Iraqi police and civil defense units that
operate under American control.

The Shiite leaders also called, in speeches and in interviews after
the meeting, for a rapid return to the American-led negotiations on
Iraq's political future. The negotiations have been sidelined for
weeks by the upsurge in violence associated with Mr. Sadr's uprising
across central and southern Iraq and the simultaneous fighting in
Falluja, the Sunni Muslim city west of Baghdad.

On Tuesday, the Shiite leaders, including a representative of a Shiite
clerical group that has close ties to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani,
effectively did what the Americans have urged them to do since Mr.
Sadr, a 31-year-old firebrand, began his attacks in April: they tied
Iraq's future, and that of Shiites in particular, to a renunciation of
violence and a return to negotiations.

Their statement repeated warnings to American troops not to enter
Najaf and Karbala in pursuit of Mr. Sadr. Although American commanders
have hinted at an offensive soon against against Mr. Sadr's force, the
Mahdi Army, they have repeatedly said they do not intend to attack
Najaf or Karbala. They have not made such a promise about Kufa, a
small city six miles northeast of Najaf, where Mr. Sadr appears to
have established his headquarters.

Although Shiite leaders have made similar demands of Mr. Sadrbefore,
it has never been in such strength. About 150 leaders attended the
gathering, representing many of Shiism's most influential political,
religious and professional groups. One group, the Supreme Council for
the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or Sciri, has close ties to Ayatollah
Sistani, who is regarded as Iraq's top Shiite cleric and the country's
most influential political voice.

It has been several weeks since Mr. Sadr suggested he might heed
Shiite leadership.

The Shiite leaders convened in Baghdad on short notice, reflecting
their urgency to calm a month's violence sown by Mr. Sadr across much
of southern Iraq. Equally disturbing to many Shiites, American
occupation officials, faced with the dual challenges from Mr. Sadr and
Sunni Muslim insurgents in Falluja, have handed some authority in
Falluja to elements of Saddam Hussein's former army, despised by
Shiites as an instrument of his repression.

Several Shiite leaders acknowledged that they had delayed issuing
their statement until there were clear signs that public opinion among
Shiites had moved strongly against Mr. Sadr. Reports in the past two
weeks have spoken of a shadowy death squad calling itself the
Thulfiqar Army shooting dead at least seven of Mr. Sadr's militiamen
in Najaf, and several thousand people attended an anti-Sadr protest
meeting outside the Imam Ali shrine in the city on Friday, according
to several of the meeting's participants.

Mr. Mahdi, from the Sciri group, which is close to Ayatollah Sistani,
was blunt about Mr. Sadr's decline in popularity. "He's 100 percent
isolated across most of the southern provinces; he's even isolated in
Najaf," he said. "The people there regard him as having taken them
hostage." He said Mr. Sadr had also been criticized by his most
powerful religious backer, Grand Ayatollah Kazem Hossein Haeri, based
in the Iranian city of Qum, who had urged Mr. Sadr to pull his
militiamen out of Najaf and Karbala and to stop storing weapons in
mosques.

Several speakers implied that the Sunni minority intended to derail
the American-led political process, and thus the prospect of a Shiite
majority government. On few occasions, if any, since the American
invasion last year, have mainstream Shiite leaders spoken so bluntly
in public of the political rivalry with the Sunnis, who were referred
to repeatedly by speakers as "they" or "the other side," and barely at
all by name.

Before joining with other Shiite leaders for the Tuesday meeting here,
Shiites on the governing council, including Mr. Mahdi, had a
tempestuous meeting with the two top American officials in Iraq, L.
Paul Bremer III, the civilian chief of the occupation authority, and
Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the commander of American forces.

At one point, the council members said, they told the Americans they
were risking civil war between Iraq's Sunni and Shiite communities by
endorsing the Falluja deal with elements of Mr. Hussein's old army.

In near 100-degree heat in the late afternoon, few of the Shiite
speakers stirred much enthusiasm. But the strongest murmurings of the
meeting came when Taqlif al-Faroun, a tribal leader from Najaf, said
Shiites should give the American forces a green light to go after Mr.
Sadr in the holy cities. "Najaf is not Mecca," he said. "The Americans
don't want to go into the shrines. They want to get rid of criminals
and thieves. So what if they enter the city?" Across the roof, dozens
of men responded approvingly. "Yes, yes!", they said.