- NAJAF, Iraq (AFP) - Shiite
Muslim radical leader Moqtada Sadr vowed to fight to his "last drop
of blood" as fighting engulfed Najaf and the threat of attack halted
output from Iraq's southern oilfields, sending world prices to record highs.
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- "I will defend Najaf until my last drop of blood,"
the fiery cleric vowed from the Imam Ali shrine, as mortar and machine-gun
fire rocked the central holy city for a fifth straight day.
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- "I am an enemy of America and America is my enemy
until the day of the last judgement," he said, rejecting calls by
interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi for his men to lay down their arms and
leave the city.
-
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- Artillery and tank fire, backed by air power, battered
Najaf where Sadr's Mehdi Army were hunkered down in the vast cemetery and
around the city-centre shrine, a militia stronghold since his spring uprising
against foreign troops.
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- Fighting eased briefly only for medics to evacuate casualties,
provincial governor Adnan al-Zorfi told AFP.
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- Defence Minister Hazem Shaalan warned that the Iraqi
army could join the offensive to "crush" the militia and a senior
US official said the marines had been given permission to enter the shrine
-- one of Shiite Islam's holiest -- to conduct their operation.
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- "But we have not done it as of now," the spokesman
said.
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- "We respect the shrine and any action taken will
be on the order and direction of the governor," he added.
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- In the main southern city of Basra, a British soldier
was killed during clashes with insurgents, the defence ministry announced
in London.
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- "There have been a number of other casualties as
well, during fighting with insurgents in our area of control," a ministry
spokesman said.
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- Salam al-Maliky, a Sadr supporter on the provincial council,
threatened to fight for the secession of the southern provinces of Basra,
Dhiqar and Maysan if US troops did not withdraw from Najaf.
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- Another Sadr aide, Asaad al-Basri, threatened attacks
against key oil infrastructure, prompting the state-owned Southern Oil
Company to announce it had stopped pumping crude.
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- "We have stopped pumping oil for security reasons,"
said company official Hasaneen Mohammed al-Mohammedi without elaborating.
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- Security was stepped up across Iraq's southern oilfields,
the only source of exports since an attack on a key pipeline artery to
Turkey halted limited deliveries from the main northern oilfields last
week.
-
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- The halt sent New York crude to an all-time high.
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- Light sweet crude for delivery in September surged 1.02
dollars to 44.97 dollars a barrel early afternoon, thundering past the
previous record, set Friday, of 44.77 dollars.
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- In Sadr's Baghdad stronghold, the government imposed
a curfew until 8:00 am (0400 GMT) in an effort to clamp down on escalating
insecurity.
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- A video purporting to show a police general kidnapped
by Sadr's militia in a bid to force the release of captured fighters was
shown on Al-Jazeera television, which the Iraqi government has banned for
a month for inciting violence.
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- The interior ministry admitted that a policeman had been
abducted from a police station in Sadr City, but insisted he was not a
high ranking officer.
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- As the situation deteriorated, UN Secretary General Kofi
Annan called for a ceasefire in Najaf.
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- "The secretary general believes that in such a situation,
force should be a last resort. He calls for every effort to be made, even
at this late hour, to work out a ceasefire and a peaceful solution,"
said a spokesman.
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- The Iraqi government has refused to negotiate with the
militiamen.
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- Elsewhere, a suicide bomber blew up a car in Baladruz,
near the restive city of Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, killing six Iraqis
and wounding 16, including an official in the local provincial government,
police said.
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- An Islamist website said militants loyal to Al-Qaeda's
alleged Iraq commander, Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi, had claimed the bombing.
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- In western Iraq, the military reported that a US marine
was killed in the volatile province of Al-Anbar.
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- Against the backdrop of continued violence, Ahmed Chalabi,
prominent politician and disgraced Pentagon darling, said he would return
to Baghdad from Tehran "in a few days" to challenge an arrest
warrant.
-
- Speaking to AFP, he dismissed the fraud allegations against
him as "outrageous, ridiculous and politically motivated lies".
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- His nephew, Salem Chalabi, head of the special tribunal
set to try ousted president Saddam Hussein, told the BBC that he would
also return to face a murder charge which he said was a deliberate ploy
to discredit the court.
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- Both will be arrested the moment they set foot in Iraq,
Zuhair al-Maliky, the judge who issued warrants against them, said.
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- Meanwhile, Iran said it was working frantically to secure
the release of one of its diplomats "detained" by an Islamist
group in Iraq for allegedly stirring sectarian strife and for activities
outside his diplomatic duties.
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- Al-Arabiya showed pictures of Fereydun Jahani's passport,
identity and business cards, including one from the Iranian Revolutionary
Guards, casting doubt on claims that Jahani was only a diplomat.
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- Copyright © 2004 Agence France Presse. All rights
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broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority
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id=1504&e=1&u=/afp/20040809/ts_afp/iraq_040809192418
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