It is not too late for firebrand Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to lay down his arms and be welcomed into the political fold, Iraq's new president said yesterday.
Interim President Ghazi al-Yawar, recently returned from the G8 summit in the US, said he welcomed al-Sadr's recent decision to create a political party that could take part in Iraq's first democratic elections in the new year.
"I kept on saying consistently that if I were in his shoes I would try to go to the political arena instead of raising arms," Yawar told reporters outside the Iraqi government building.
PHOTO: REUTERS
"He has supporters, he has constituents, he should go through the political process and I commend this smart move on his side."
Al-Sadr launched an uprising against US-led occupying troops two months ago, but earlier this month agreed a truce in Najaf and Kerbala under pressure from Shiite religious leaders.
The US-led administration in Iraq says al-Sadr must surrender to an Iraqi arrest warrant in connection with the murder of a rival cleric in Najaf last year, and is reluctant to see him take a leading role in Iraq's political process.
US troops arrested a senior aide and spokesman to al-Sadr in an overnight raid in the holy city of Kerbala, his office said.
But Yawar said the young cleric was innocent until proven guilty and could enter Iraqi politics as soon as he disbands his Mahdi Army militia, thought to number several thousand.
"In the new Iraq nobody is above the law. However, he is not convicted, his name has been brought as a suspect in a certain incident. So he has to make sure he clears himself," Yawar said.
Meanwhile, a series of explosions rocked a US base at the eastern entrance of Kerbala yesterday, while elsewhere more Iraqis were reported killed in separate attacks.
Witnesses said mortar shells were fired from an area near the base which is heavily populated. US forces set up joint checkpoints with Kerbala police and civil defense corps and fired at the area from where the shells were believed to have been fired.
In Babylon, south of Baghdad, a professor at the Babylon Religious College was assassinated as he was leaving the campus yesterday morning, witnesses said. Islamic history professor Abdel Hussein Abdullah was shot by unknown assailants from a speeding car.
Also see story:
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats
RSS