New clash between militia and Iraq police

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
Media: AFP
Byline: n/a
Date: 21 October 2006

Body:


KUT, Iraq, Oct 21, 2006 (AFP) - Fighting erupted between Iraqi police and
Shiite militiamen in a town southeast of Baghdad on Saturday, police said,
as army troops quelled clashes further south.

Police Lieutenant Colonel Mohammed Hassan told AFP that gunbattles were
underway in the town of Suweira, a mainly Shiite community on the Tigris
river 60 kilometres (35 miles) from the capital.

"Two Mahdi Army and one civilian have been killed. Five others are injured,
including three gunmen and two civilians," he said, adding that two militia
vehicles had been burnt out in the fighting.

The Mahdi Army is a loosely organised militia nominally loyal to radical
Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, which is an increasingly powerful and
unpredictable force in Baghdad and southern Iraq.

On Thursday and Friday, Mahdi fighters fought fierce clashes with police in
the southern city of Amara, leaving 25 people dead and more than 150
injured before Sadr himself ordered them to stand down.

Police in Hilla said they intervened to halt a clash between rival Shiite
militias after the Mahdi Army was accused of planting a bomb by an office
of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI).

One SCIRI guard was injured in the blast, police said in Hilla, a mainly
Shiite town south of Baghdad.
 
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