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29 March 2024

Iraqi soldiers warn Sadr City residents to flee

Published
By AP
 

Iraqi soldiers for the first time warned residents in the embattled Sadr City district to leave their houses on Thursday, signaling a new push by the US-backed forces against Shiite extremist who have been waging street battles for seven weeks.

Iraqi soldiers, using loudspeakers, told residents in some areas of southeastern Sadr City, which were virtually abandoned, to go to nearby soccer stadiums, residents said. Unicef says about 6,000 people have been forced to flee their homes in Sadr City, most of them from the southeastern section.

US forces have increased air power and armoured patrols in an attempt to cripple Shiite militia influence in Sadr City, a slum of 2.5 million people that serves as the Baghdad base for the Mahdi Army led by anti-American cleric Muqtada Al Sadr.

The US military is trying to weaken the militia grip in the slum and disrupt rocket and mortar strikes from Sadr City on the US-protected Green Zone, which includes the US Embassy and key Iraqi government offices.

Several civilians were injured in rocket or mortar attacks that hit downtown Baghdad earlier this week.

The battles started in late March after the Iraqi government opened a crackdown on militias and armed gangs in the southern city of Basra, including some groups Washington says have links to Iran.

Meanwhile, a former leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, Mulla Nadhim Al Jibouri, was wounded in a suicide attack in the city of Samarra, about 95 kilometres north of Baghdad, on Thursday, Iraqi police said.

The attack came after Iraqi and US soldiers killed five Sunni insurgents who belonged to Al Qaeda in Samarra overnight, police said.

In Sadr City, at least seven people were killed and 20 wounded in clashes late Wednesday, Iraqi health officials said on Thursday. It was not clear whether any militants were among them.

On Wednesday, Claire Hajaj, a Unicef spokeswoman based in Jordan, said up to 150,000 people – including 75,000 children – were isolated in sections of Sadr City “cordoned off by military forces.” She said about 6,000 have fled their homes.

Iraqi soldiers on Thursday shut down a local radio station, Al Aahad, run by the Sadrists after raiding offices of the station in a neighbourhood near Sadr City, police said.

Gunmen wearing police uniforms killed a police captain on Wednesday after kidnapping him from a police station in Shiite neighbourhood of Abu Dshir, police said on Thursday. His body was found near the station.

In the southeastern Shiite city of Kut, gunmen on Thursday stormed the Technical Institute and abducted a professor, Nuri Kamil Khanjar, local police said. It was not clear why Khanjar was kidnapped.