.Iraq's most powerful Shiite party blasts Sadrist cleric over crticism
BAGHDAD: Iraq's most powerful Shiite party on Saturday responded angrily against criticism made by a Sadrist imam over a recent visit by the party's leader to the United States.
The Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council labeled as "a dangerous precedent" a Sadrist cleric's comments about a White House meeting last week between SIIC leader Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim and U.S. President George W. Bush.
Sheik Salah al-Obeidi, a senior official in the office of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in Najaf, told worshippers in a Friday sermon that the meeting in Washington was a mistake, calling it an act of "surrender."
"We say to such people that such conclusions and judgments are not true ... and they reveal a great deal of ignorance," said a statement by the party. Al-Obeidi's charges, it said, amounted to an insult against millions of Iraqis.
Al-Sadr, who is opposed to the U.S. presence in Iraq, and al-Hakim signed an agreement two months ago to end their bitter rivalry. But the deal has done little to ease tension between the two sides.
"Such talk (by al-Obeidi) represents a dangerous precedent that aims at distorting our patriotic figures in the same method used by the Mukhabarat of Saddam's regime ... and this only serves the interests of the enemies of Iraq," the statement said, referring to Saddam's intelligence agency.
The latest quarrel between the two groups is part of a power struggle over leadership of the country's majority Shiites. The struggle is most intense in the southern part of the country, home to most of Iraq's oil reserves and the Shiite shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala.
Security forces in the region are known to be dominated by supporters of the Supreme Council, and al-Hakim's family has been locked in a long-running competition with al-Sadr's family over leadership of Iraq's Shiites.
Stepped up raids by U.S. and Iraqi forces against al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia have deepened the rift between the two sides, with al-Sadr loyalists suspecting their rivals of having a hand in the crackdown. The Sadrists also are opposed to al-Hakim's dream of creating a self-rule region in the nine provinces of southern Iraq, insisting that such an entity would eventually lead to the breakup of Iraq.
Dozens of al-Sadr supporters marched through the streets of the northwestern Shiite neighborhood of Shula in Baghdad on Saturday to protest U.S.-led raids and to demand the release of Sadrist detainees.
IHT
The Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council labeled as "a dangerous precedent" a Sadrist cleric's comments about a White House meeting last week between SIIC leader Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim and U.S. President George W. Bush.
Sheik Salah al-Obeidi, a senior official in the office of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in Najaf, told worshippers in a Friday sermon that the meeting in Washington was a mistake, calling it an act of "surrender."
"We say to such people that such conclusions and judgments are not true ... and they reveal a great deal of ignorance," said a statement by the party. Al-Obeidi's charges, it said, amounted to an insult against millions of Iraqis.
Al-Sadr, who is opposed to the U.S. presence in Iraq, and al-Hakim signed an agreement two months ago to end their bitter rivalry. But the deal has done little to ease tension between the two sides.
"Such talk (by al-Obeidi) represents a dangerous precedent that aims at distorting our patriotic figures in the same method used by the Mukhabarat of Saddam's regime ... and this only serves the interests of the enemies of Iraq," the statement said, referring to Saddam's intelligence agency.
The latest quarrel between the two groups is part of a power struggle over leadership of the country's majority Shiites. The struggle is most intense in the southern part of the country, home to most of Iraq's oil reserves and the Shiite shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala.
Security forces in the region are known to be dominated by supporters of the Supreme Council, and al-Hakim's family has been locked in a long-running competition with al-Sadr's family over leadership of Iraq's Shiites.
Stepped up raids by U.S. and Iraqi forces against al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia have deepened the rift between the two sides, with al-Sadr loyalists suspecting their rivals of having a hand in the crackdown. The Sadrists also are opposed to al-Hakim's dream of creating a self-rule region in the nine provinces of southern Iraq, insisting that such an entity would eventually lead to the breakup of Iraq.
Dozens of al-Sadr supporters marched through the streets of the northwestern Shiite neighborhood of Shula in Baghdad on Saturday to protest U.S.-led raids and to demand the release of Sadrist detainees.
IHT
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