Tense military atmosphere lingers in Holy Najaf, although fighting slows down
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
Najaf, Aug 13, IRNA -- US Apache helicopters kept flying over the war-stricken Najaf throughout Friday morning and the tense military atmosphere that has haunted this city holy city lingered, although the military clashes have slowed down. Najaf Governor General Adnan az-Zarfi said here on Friday that talks between the interim Iraqi government`s representatives and combatant Shi`a cleric Moqtada Sadr, that started at noon time, Friday, were still going on at the time, although no tangible results were achieved yet. Iraq`s Health Ministry published a report on Friday morning in Baghdad, according to which the military clashes in Najaf had up to late Thursday evening claimed 165 lives and left 600 more injured individuals, among whom there were Iraqi children, women and elderly folks. As the military clashes slowed down around noon time Friday, the war shattered holy city`s residents found an opportunity to leave their houses after nearly a week, during which they were couped up in them, to look for the basic necessities of their lives. The general atmosphere in Najaf is currently quite tense and horrifying, and the city`s residents, fearing that the clashes between the US military forces and Iraqi resistance fighters would resume at any moment are hurriedly looking for what food and medical items they could get access to before that happens. The US forces are still besieging Najaf, and around noontime, they refrained form permitting a medical convoy, including medicare personnel, to enter the war shattered, occupied city. The said convoy that had left Baghdad an hour before being halted at Najaf`s northern entrance, was dispatched by The Assembly of Iraqi Sunni Alims for the residents of Najaf. According to IRNA correspondents at the site, talks between the US military officials and the medical convoy`s care takers, who are trying to convince them to permit the convoy to enter Najaf are still going on. Heavy clashes in Najaf have also made the Islamic world officials react, and they have mainly condemned the United States for ruining the sanctity of some of the holiest Islamic sites, while massacring the oppressed Iraqi citizens. Iran`s supreme leader Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, while condemning the United States for repeated violation of the sanctity of one of the holiest Islamic sites, has assured the Americans that the Iraqi nation would make them pay dearly for such impudence. Also the grand Mufti of the Lebanese Sunnis Muhammad-Rashid al-Qubbani, stressed in Beirut on Friday that the sad events in Najaf are the result of disunity among Arab governments. The Spokesman of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution of Iraq (SCIRI) in Tehran, Mohsen Hakim, too, said here on Friday that the SCIRI Secretary General Seyed Abdul-Aziz Hakim was ready rush to holy Najaf to mediate between the US forces and Sadr`s militia in order to solve the ongoing, week-long bloody clashes peacefully. Hakim has informed the interim Iraqi government about the matter, according to his son, Mohsen, but there has still been no response to his offer. The Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa, too, has asked both sides engaged in Najaf clashes" to observe patience and to end the bloody clashes that is claiming civilians` lives, as well. Meanwhile, the military clashes between resistance fighters, and the US-led occupation forces throughout Iraq continued on Friday, in which the civilians suffered most casualties. In Baghdad`s shabby southern Shi`a suburb, Sadr City, there were heavy clashes between the US military forces and the city`s residents and the city was still besieged heavily by US forces who absolutely prevented the entrance, or exit of all vehicles and pedestrians into, or out of the city. The number of casualties in Iraq`s southern Kout city, that was heavily bombed by US warplanes on Friday morning is increasing as time passes, and according to latest reports, at least seven Iraqi civilians, including three children, have so far lost their lives, while at least 34 other civilians have been critically wounded. Kout is a small city near Basra, in which during the past few days at least 84 Iraqi civilians have lost their lives as a result of heavy shelling of the city by US military forces from air and land. According to latest reports, the occupation forces also got engaged in military clashes with the people of Iraq`s southern Basra and Mousel cities on Friday, but there is still no report about the number of casualties, or their magnitude. The dispatches also spoke of an agreement to end days of fighting in the holy city of Najaf to be near at hand, according to Iraq`s government spokesman on Friday, who confirmed that ministers were working in the holy city to end the standoff and clerics across Iraq criticized the government at Friday prayers for days of fighting between US-led Iraqi forces and Shi`a Muslim militiamen in Najaf. Iraqi police detained an Al-Arabiyya cameraman in the embattled central city of Najaf on Friday and took him to an unknown location, the Dubai-based satellite television said. And thousands of Shi`a Muslims vowed Friday to flock to the holy city of Najaf to form a human chain around the revered Imam Ali PBUH`s holy shrine after militia leader Moqtada Sadr was reportedly wounded in battle. 2329/1771
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