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U.S., Iraqi Forces Reinforce Positions In Al-Najaf

24 August 2004 -- News agencies are reporting that in Al-Najaf, Iraqi National Guardsmen have been deployed along U.S. troops positioned near the Imam Ali shrine, where Shi'ite militants fighting U.S. forces have been holed up for weeks.

The reports come as Iraq's interim Defense Minister Hazim Sha'lan al-Khuza'i said today that "the decisive hours are near" to ending the standoff. Al-Khuza'i and other Iraqi officials have made similar claims over the last week.

Earlier today, U.S. aircraft, artillery, and tanks were used in the latest assaults targeting the fighters loyal to Shi'ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

In Baghdad today, Iraq's environment and education ministers were both unharmed in two separate attacks on their respective convoys. Five of the ministers' bodyguards were killed, and more than 10 other people were injured in the blasts.

(Reuters/AFP/AP)

Copyright (c) 2004. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. www.rferl.org