Iraqi troops pour into Shiite stronghold as truce takes effect
Iraqi troops poured into the Baghdad Shiite district of Sadr City Tuesday for the first time in eight weeks as militiamen who have been battling US forces held their fire in line with a truce deal.
Large numbers of heavily armed soldiers fanned out in Sadr City for the first time since the deadly fighting broke out between loyalists of anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and US troops in late March.
Security officials said they launched Operation Peace at dawn to clear areas where mines had been planted by Shiite militiamen in the teeming slum district of some two million people in northeast Baghdad.
The action by Iraqi troops is in line with a truce deal reached on May 10 between the government and Sadr's Shiite radical movement.
"Hundreds of Iraqi soldiers are deployed in different sectors of the city," an officer leading a unit of armoured vehicles told AFP. He said troops had already cleared several landmines.
"Residents are cooperating with the Iraqi forces, they welcomed our presence. There were no attacks that targeted the Iraqi military. The situation is peaceful."
An AFP correspondent in Sadr City said residents were welcoming the Iraqi soldiers who began spreading out across the district while US soldiers remained deployed outside.
No gunfire was heard for the first time in weeks, when residents ran the risk of getting caught up in the crossfire between the militiamen and the American troops.
Streets were crowded with people going about their daily lives among the ruins of dozens of buildings damaged in the fighting.
"The entry of Iraqi security forces does not represent a violation of the (truce) deal," Sadr spokesman Salah al-Obeidi told AFP from the central shrine city of Najaf. "The forces have a right to enter and ensure law and order."
However, he said there had been a violation on Monday when US troops arrested several residents of Sadr City.
The US military said that the latest operation was planned and executed by the Iraqi security forces.
"The operation is to protect the people while setting conditions for sustainable security and increase humanitarian assistance, economic growth and essential services," a statement said.
Much of the fighting had centred around a huge concrete wall that the US military has been building to cut off one third of the Sadr City in a bid to prevent the flow of heavy weapons to the rest of Baghdad.
Work on the wall became a key issue for the militiamen who repeatedly attacked those constructing it under tight US protection.
During the weeks of the fighting, the US military carried out repeated air strikes with Hellfire missiles against any suspect activity in the area but on Tuesday there was no sign of US helicopters in the skies overhead.
Hundreds of people, many of them civilians caught up in the crossfire, died in the clashes in Sadr City which erupted after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered a crackdown on militias, starting in the main southern city of Basra, in late March.
The fighting quickly spread across Shiite areas of Iraq, particularly Sadr City, a bastion of Sadr's Mahdi Army militia.
At least eight people, including a seven-year-old girl, died in other violence around Iraq on Tuesday, security officials said.
Two of the attacks targeted commanders of Sunni militias allied with the United States in the fight against al-Qaeda, they added.
AFP
