/ 19 April 2004

Al-Sadr conditionally backs UN force

Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has reversed his opposition to the deployment of United Nations peacekeepers in Iraq as long as certain conditions are met, a close aide said on Monday.

”We favour the despatch of such a force on condition that it be made up of Muslim countries or countries which did not join the occupation of Iraq, such as Russia, France or Germany,” said Qais al-Khazaali, spokesperson for al-Sadr’s banned Mehdi Army militia.

He also said the UN force must entrust law and order duties to Iraqi security forces.

Al-Sadr, who is wanted in connection with the murder of a rival pro-United States cleric, had previously rejected any role for the UN in Iraq, arguing that the world body was taking its orders from the US-led occupation forces.

In an interview with Bulgarian television broadcast on Sunday, Khazaali demanded UN troops replace the US-led coalition forces.

He said it was ”in the interest of the whole world to send peacekeeping forces under the UN flag” to Iraq.

Spain denies troop withdrawal will expose country to terror

The new Socialist government rejected an opposition claim on Monday that its decision to withdraw all 1 300 Spanish troops from the US-led occupying force in Iraq would make Spain more vulnerable to terrorist attacks and sour relations with the US.

Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos told Cadena Ser radio that he hoped to visit Washington on Wednesday for talks with US Secretary of State Colin Powell and the National Security Adviser, Condoleezza Rice.

Moratinos said he telephoned Powell on Sunday a few hours before Prime Minister Luis Rodriguez Zapatero announced that he was ordering the troops out of Iraq ”as soon as possible” in line with an election campaign pledge.

He said Powell was ”somewhat disappointed, but he also told me that he understood the political nature of the decision and said that of course he wanted to maintain the best level of relations with me and with the Spanish government”.

Moratinos was responding to a charge made earlier by the leader of the opposition conservative Popular Party, Mariano Rajoy, that the decision to pull out the troops was ”not a good message in the fight against terrorism and makes Spain more vulnerable”.

The Popular Party suffered an unexpected general election defeat on March 14, three days after 191 people were killed and 1 900 wounded in a series of coordinated bomb blasts aboard four crowded commuter trains entering Madrid in the early-morning rush hour.

A gang of suspected bombers who blew themselves up to avoid capture by the police on April 3 left a video warning of further attacks unless Spain withdrew from ”Muslim lands”.

Moratinos acknowledged that ”there is terrorism in Iraq” but said ”it is terrorism which affects Iraqi society” and added: ”We must commit ourselves to strengthening the international fight against terrorism in areas that are a priority for us.”

Spain would ”honour its commitments firmly and with enormous resolve”, he said.

In Iraq on Monday, a spokesperson for Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, who heads opposition to the year-old occupation of his country, called on al-Sadr’s followers to stop attacks on and ”ensure the security of Spanish troops until their departure”.

The spokesperson, Qais al-Khazaali, urged other countries with troops in the US-led coalition to ”follow the example of Spain and to withdraw their forces to save the lives of their soldiers”.

But Rajoy said the withdrawal of the Spanish contingent ”makes Spain a less dependable country for its international partners” and added: ”If all countries were to adopt a similar decision, we would leave 26-million Iraqis to their own fate.”

In Tokyo, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda said the Japanese government hoped that Spain would continue to be involved in rebuilding Iraq even after its troops leave.

”Prime Minister Zapatero is not saying he will do nothing” from now on, Fukuda told a news conference, noting the Spanish premier had pledged that Spain would take part in ”collaboration projects” in Iraq.

US to reduce troop numbers at Najaf

The US military on Monday announced plans to cut the size of the force it has built up outside the holy city of Najaf.

The development comes amid signs of progress in talks to end the tense standoff with al-Sadr.

Colonel Dana Pittard, commander of the 2 500-strong Third Brigade Task Force outside Najaf — where al-Sadr is holed up with hundreds of his Mahdi Army fighters — said the force would be withdrawn over the coming days, and would be replaced by about 2 000 soldiers from the First Armoured Division.

The development is the latest sign that the US commanders, who are eager to avoid a costly battle in the city, could be preparing to back away from their pledge to ”kill or capture” al-Sadr.

The US appears to be placing more faith in ceasefire negotiations, which are under way through Iraqi and Iranian intermediaries, in an effort to find a peaceful solution to the impasse.

”Because of where negotiations are right now, we can wait,” Pittard said. ”We still want Iraqis to solve the problem.”

However, a senior coalition official, who asked not to be named, suggested that it was too early to say whether the talks were likely to succeed.

”It’s difficult to get a sense of what’s real and what isn’t,” the official said.

The US military, which is fighting against Sunni guerrillas in western Iraq and against al-Sadr’s militiamen in Shia areas of the country, has lost more troops in combat over the past three weeks than during the three-week war that toppled Saddam.

Since March 31, 104 US troops have been killed in action. Ten US soldiers, including five marines who died in clashes with guerrillas near the Syrian border, were killed in fighting on Saturday.

However, a senior coalition military official said that the 24 hours to this morning had been ”remarkably” quiet, with no troops killed and the number of attacks down to 21 from an average of about 50 over the past two weeks.

”However, one day does not a trend make,” the official said.

Mortar round hits Swedish embassy grounds

Meanwhile, a mortar round hit the Swedish embassy grounds in Baghdad on Monday, causing no casualties, police said.

”The mortar round exploded on the [embassy] grounds, destroying a wooden shack, but causing no injuries,” said police Colonel Ihsan Gahtan outside the Swedish mission in central Baghdad.

Earlier another police officer, Abdallah Jabbar Bidan, reported an explosion inside the embassy.

US troops aboard four Humvee military jeeps and Iraqi police later arrived on the scene and units of the paramilitary Iraqi Civil Defence Corps were deployed in the area.

No Swedes were working at the embassy, the Swedish Foreign Ministry said.

”We have no Swedish employees there now. There is one local caretaker at the embassy,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Henning Envall said in Stockholm. — Sapa-AFP, Guardian Unlimited Â