U.S. Declares Radical Shiite an ‘Outlaw’

U.S. administrators geared up Monday for a showdown with the anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtader Sadr, declaring him an “outlaw” and making public a warrant for his arrest on charges that he was involved in the slaying of a rival religious leader last year.

Sadr’s armed followers all but shut down the holy city of Najaf and skirmished in Baghdad with U.S. troops in the second day of deadly rioting across Iraq.

Clashes between Sadr’s supporters and soldiers with the U.S.-led coalition have killed at least 52 Iraqis and nine coalition troops, including eight Americans. At least 160 Iraqis and 40 troops have been injured.

The armed revolt led by Sadr has raised fears here and in Washington that the U.S. -- already battling an armed insurgency believed to be waged mainly by Sunni Muslims -- is not prepared to confront a new uprising by members of Iraq’s Shiite majority. On Monday, senior defense officials in Washington began studying how they could add more troops to the 135,000-member U.S. force if violence increased.

In Charlotte, N.C., President Bush told reporters that Sadr’s removal was a necessary step toward protecting democracy. “This is one person who is deciding that rather than allow democracy to flourish, he’s going to exercise force,” he said. “We just can’t let it stand.”

In Kufa, a holy city near Najaf, Sadr took refuge in the mosque he controls and declared that he was “proud” to be considered an outlaw by the U.S.-led occupation, according to a statement sent to Arab media.

“I’m accused by one of the leaders of evil, Bremer, of being an outlaw,” the 30-year-old cleric said, referring to U.S. civilian administrator L. Paul Bremer III. “If that means breaking the law of the American tyranny and its filthy constitution [for Iraq], I’m proud of that and that is why I’m in revolt.”

With no negotiations between Sadr and the Americans, more violence appeared likely, a scenario that could increase instability and make more difficult the planned June 30 transfer of power to Iraqis. Armed, black-clad members of Sadr’s Al Mahdi army, a volunteer militia, surrounded the mosaic-covered Imam Ali Mosque in the center of Najaf in a demonstration apparently aimed at intimidating more moderate Shiite clerics and many Najaf natives who have not supported the uprising.

Most shops in Najaf closed early, and Sadr followers were still on the premises of several police stations. In Kufa, militants stood guard around the shrine that is Sadr’s headquarters. Gunmen were at the ready on the parapet.

It was unclear whether Sadr’s confrontation with the U.S. was gathering support for his cause or losing it. Some Shiites said they were unhappy with his takeover of police stations and shrines, saying that he had no right to disrupt the government.

A spokesman for Seyyid Mohammed Bahr Uloom, a member of the U.S.-backed Governing Council, but also a respected figure in the Najaf clerical community, said that the Hawza, the religious seminary in which the most influential Shiite clerics teach, had asked Sadr not to resort to violence, but that he refused to listen, wire services reported.

Another high-ranking cleric, Sadruddin Qubanchi, a member of the powerful Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, who often delivers the Friday sermon at the Imam Ali Mosque, made it clear that while the Shiite clergy did not support the U.S. occupation, Sadr’s position was unacceptable.

“The current escalation and confrontation with the occupation forces does not represent the position taken” by other leading Shiite groups, Qubanchi said. “At the same time we condemn the provocation by the occupation forces, we ... ban the shedding of blood.”

Analysts said negotiations involving other Shiite leaders was probably the only way the standoff could be resolved.

Sadr is accused of complicity in last April’s murder of Abdul Majid Khoei, a vocal opponent of Saddam Hussein who fled to England in 1991 but returned shortly after the fall of Baghdad. A cleric who counseled tolerance and unity among Muslims, and who many thought would have been a key moderating influence in Iraq, Khoei was stabbed to death in Najaf.

If the U.S.-led coalition arrests Sadr, the confrontation could lead to much bloodletting because Sadr’s supporters have vowed to defend him to the death. Although Sadr does not command majority support from Iraq’s roughly 15 million Shiites, his followers are fervent. They dominate the Shiite slums of Baghdad as well as wielding influence in many southern cities.

Apart from preaching against the U.S. occupation, Sadr advocates a theocratic state and rejects any efforts at reconciliation with Hussein’s outlawed Baathist party.

U.S. officials warned Monday that they would not allow their authority to be flouted.

“Effectively he [Sadr] is attempting to establish his authority in the place of the legitimate authority. We will not tolerate this. We will reassert the law and order which the Iraqi people expect,” Bremer told a security team convened to discuss how to respond to Sadr.

Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt issued a strong warning. “The tactics of the Mahdi army over the past 48 hours is clearly inconsistent with a safe and secure environment, and clearly inconsistent with the security of the people of Iraq,” he said. “Individuals who create violence, who incite violence, who execute violence against persons inside of Iraq will be hunted down and captured or killed. It is that simple.”

The day after Sunday’s clashes in Sadr City, a sprawling Baghdad slum named after the cleric’s assassinated father, many people blamed the U.S. for the casualties.

“Muqtader’s followers are our brothers and friends. We blame the Americans for this,” said Jamil Kadhim, 31, a pharmacist assistant at a Sadr City hospital. “Muqtader has not done anything, most of the casualties yesterday were old men, women, children; they had nothing to do with politics.

“We all shed tears, we will join Muqtader, we will go into the streets,” he said.

It was unclear whether the U.S.-led coalition anticipated that its arrest of a top Sadr aide Saturday would set off such violent clashes.

The tension with Sadr’s militia precedes Saturday’s Shiite holiday of Arbain, which marks the end of 40 days of mourning for prophet Muhammad’s grandson Hussein.

The holiday is expected to draw more than a million pilgrims to the holy city of Karbala and many to Najaf as well. During the festival, many Shiites beat their chests, chant and hit their backs with chains in passionate commemoration of Hussein’s martyrdom.

“The coalition has underestimated the Iraqi temperament,” said Sheik Hassan Tueiyma, a teacher at the Khalisi school in the Kadhimiya Shiite neighborhood of Baghdad. “The Iraqi people are eager for martyrdom. These are people who have been oppressed and forced to fight in wars for 30 years. They do not fear confrontation.”

The warrant for Sadr’s arrest -- and several others linked to the Khoei slaying -- was issued several months ago. U.S. officials said they had no choice but to make it public, saying they had only heeded a request from the Iraqi judge handling the case of the slain cleric.

An example of the bloodshed likely to continue was on display in the Baghdad neighborhood of Shula. Sadr supporters and coalition troops faced off Monday, leaving small fires in the streets, roads cut off by boulders, and sidewalks and bridges blocked with barbed wire.

At least one Iraqi died and 38 were wounded in fighting when Sadr militiamen fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a military convoy and U.S. soldiers with the 1st Armored Division returned fire.

The militants also fired at a U.S. Apache attack helicopter, hitting the cockpit. U.S. helicopters responded by firing 100 rounds at the attackers, Kimmitt said.

The attack sent hundreds of Sadr followers and bystanders scurrying for cover.

“Iraq is burning from the north to the south. Muqtader Sadr has a very broad popular base, and I don’t think it’s in the interests of the occupation forces to arrest him. If they do, you can be assured, they will have millions of rebels to deal with,” said Tueiyma, the teacher. “People will say, ‘If they can do this to Muqtader, they can do it to anyone.’ ”

Meanwhile, two U.S. soldiers were reported killed Sunday. The military said Monday that a 1st Infantry Division soldier was killed and six were wounded near a police academy in the northern city of Kirkuk when a bomb in a vehicle exploded. In Mosul, also in the north, a bomb killed a soldier assigned to Task Force Olympia and wounded another.

*

Times staff writers Nicholas Riccardi and Edmund Sanders in Baghdad and special correspondent Saad Fakr Deen in Najaf contributed to this report.

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In stories after April 9, 2004, Shiite cleric Muqtader Sadr is correctly referred to as Muqtada Sadr.

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