Loud explosions rock southern edge of Najaf
NAJAF, Iraq (AFP) - A series of loud explosions rocked the southern edge of the Iraqi Shiite holy city of Najaf from about 11:00 am (0700 GMT) on Friday, hours after fighting broke out between US troops and militiamen in the city's vast cemetery.
The explosions came from an area where US forces and radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr's Mehdi army militia are facing off, south of the sacred Imam Ali mausoleum.
The explosions were heard shortly before Friday prayers at Najaf, one of Shiite Islam's holiest cities.
Shooting was also heard from the southern and western entrances to the city, and hospital sources said seven people, including an Afghan pilgrim, had been wounded.
Earlier at least three US tanks were seen in a cemetery northwest of the city centre about one kilometre (less than mile) from the shrine, and US helicopters hovered over the area.
Armed black-clad men veiled with scarves were seen running inside the sprawling cemetery and fanning out across the area.
Heavy black smoke was seen rising from the cemetery and the sound of heavy guns was heard.
In the area to the south, known as Bahr al-Najaf, some 2,500 US soldiers are camped in the desert.
Sadr's fighters have dug in with heavy weapons on a hill overlooking Bahr, about 100 meters (yards) south of the shrine.
Their military command post is also in this area right behind the shrine.
The fighting comes one day after Najaf's new police chief Ghaleb al-Jazairi accused militiamen of "terrorising" residents and asked them to leave.
The newly appointed governor Adnan al-Zorfi told AFP late Thursday that a "US entry into the centre of Najaf may be imminent," saying that a lot of those around Sadr were "simple men who did not fathom the military might of the United States."
"Nobody can set conditions on the Americans," he said, urging Sadr to disband his militia "immediately" and promising that the matter of legal proceedings against him in connection with the murder of a rival cleric last year "could be resolved in Baghdad."
Sadr snubbed on Wednesday all mediation efforts and calls to disband his Mehdi Army militia, vowing to lead his men to martyrdom.
From Yahoo
