Friday, April 23, 2004
Some Iraqis said the purge was a mistake from the start.
KUFA, Iraq (AP) -- A Shiite Muslim cleric threatened to launch suicide attacks if U.S. troops attack him and his forces in the holy city of Najaf.
Muqtada al-Sadr was speaking during prayers today in Kufa, another Shiite Muslim holy city few miles from Najaf. The area is mostly controlled by his Al-Mahdi Army militia, whose members have clashed with U.S. troops several times since their uprising began April 4.
"Some of the mujahedeen brothers have told me they want to carry out martyrdom attacks, but I am postponing this," al-Sadr said in front of thousands of worshippers. "When we are forced to do so and when our city and holy sites are attacked, we will all be time bombs in the face of the enemy."
Condemned bombings
He condemned suicide bombings Wednesday in the southern city of Basra that killed 73 people because they targeted Iraqi police and civilians.
U.S. forces are deployed outside Najaf, but their mission to capture or kill al-Sadr has effectively been put on hold while negotiators try to resolve the standoff. U.S. commanders say they have no intention for the time being of entering Najaf, the holiest Shiite city.
Al-Sadr is wanted in the April 2003 killing of a rival cleric.
U.S. administrators are easing the purge of members of Saddam Hussein's disbanded party, allowing thousands of former Baathist army officers and teachers back in their jobs, officials said today.
Some Iraqi leaders welcomed the change, saying the policy of strict de-Baathification was a mistake from the start that fueled the anti-U.S. insurgency. The move, however, is likely to face opposition, especially among Kurds and Shiites who were brutally suppressed by Saddam's Baath Party and welcomed the purge.
L. Paul Bremer, the top U.S. administrator in Iraq, is expected to announce the new policy in a national address tonight on Al-Iraqiya, a U.S.-funded television station.
Popular decision at first
The U.S. decision to disband the military and the Baath after Saddam's fall was at first popular. But it led to widespread unemployment, especially among the Sunni minority that formed the core of Saddam's regime, some of whom joined the ranks of the anti-U.S. insurgency, Iraqis and U.S. commanders say.
The new change comes during the bloodiest month since the U.S. occupation began, with U.S. forces fighting Sunni Muslim insurgents in the center of the country and Shiite militiamen in the south.
Under the new policy, high-ranking members of the Baath Party and Baathists who committed crimes will be still excluded from public jobs, said Mahmoud Othman, a member of the Iraqi Governing Council, which Bremer briefed on the new policy Thursday.
But some 11,000 school teachers and professors who were forced to join the party will be allowed to take their jobs back, Othman said.
Restrictions against Baathist army officers will also be eased and the process of appealing disqualifications due to party membership will be sped up, officials said.
In Fallujah, an overwhelmingly Sunni city that has been the site of some of the worst fighting, a top Marine commander said that some of the insurgents are unemployed army officers driven to fight out of frustration.
Col. John Coleman, chief of staff for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, said his soldiers are trying to differentiate between hard-core rebels who will fight to the death and former officers who might be persuaded to lay down their arms.
Handing over of weapons
Marine commanders warned Thursday that guerrillas in Fallujah have only days to hand over their heavy weapons or face a possible attack.
Early Thursday, Marines launched an assault against the village of Karma, just outside of Fallujah, in a second attempt to force out guerrillas there. "The enemy is taking casualties; we are not," Maj. Gen. James N. Mattis said.
Last week, fierce fighting in the village left 100 insurgents dead, according to Marine commanders.
During Thursday's meeting with the council, Bremer pointed to the Education and Health Ministries as instances where former Baathists could make a contribution, an aide of Shiite Governing Council member Salama al-Khafaji said.
Al-Khafaji did not oppose the relaxing of the purge, saying there is a difference between "Saddamists, who were serving Saddam, and the Baathists who were not Saddamists. Those [Baathists] could be brought back," said the aide, Sheik Fateh Kashef al-Ghataa.
Othman welcomed the changes in de-Baathification, but said they were "a bit late."
Dismissing the Baath "created unemployment and a lot of people went into the streets with guns and became enemies," Othman said.
Aggressive purge
Council member Ahmad Chalabi, a close ally of the Pentagon and a longtime Saddam opponent, has led the De-Baathification Commission in charge of pushing former party members out of government and hearing appeals from those who want to keep their jobs. The commission has been so aggressive that even some U.S. officials have complained that it was getting rid of people with needed expertise.
Saddam's Baathist party was in power for some 34 years and controlled almost all sectors of society. Teachers, civil servants and army officers were often required to join the party. Some 1.5 million of Iraq's 24 million people are believed to have been party members.