Alleged cult members detained

LOS ANGELES TIMES
BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Iraqi forces early Friday rounded up 38 alleged members of a Shiite Muslim cult involved in a battle last month with Iraqi and U.S. troops that left hundreds dead and injured.
Three contingents of Iraqi police raided several neighborhoods in the southern Iraqi city of Hillah and detained members of a mysterious religious group called Heaven's Army, said Brig. Gen. Abbas Jabouri, commander of the Hillah-based Scorpion Brigade.
Police also seized weapons, books and leaflets associated with the group.
Jabouri said the Hillah raids were an extension of a highly vaunted Iraqi and U.S. Baghdad security crackdown called Operation Law and Order. Although the operation is primarily meant to stem sectarian violence and restore calm in the capital, similar offensives have been launched in volatile sections of southern Iraq, including Basra.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and President Bush discussed the Baghdad security plan Friday in a videoconference, the Iraqi government announced. According to a news release, al-Maliki said the plan had achieved "tremendous success" in its first few days and that Bush had vowed continued U.S. support for the operation.
The security crackdown, which began Tuesday evening, calls for raiding neighborhoods in search of weapons and militia leaders before establishing small community bases staffed by U.S. and Iraqi forces.
"Together, with our Iraqi counterparts, we will maintain a full-time presence on the streets," Maj. Gen. Joseph Fil Jr., commander of U.S.-led forces in Baghdad, told reporters. "We'll do this by building and manning joint security stations. The effort to establish these joint security stations is well under way."
On Friday morning, U.S. and Iraqi forces in the capital raided two apartment buildings suspected of housing militia leaders.
in the mostly Shiite eastern New Baghdad district. Authorities arrested at least four suspects and seized 12 weapons, cell phones, computers and documents, police said.